Galway Bay FM Newsroom – Dunnes Stores has been ordered by the High Court to reopen its doors at Edward Square Shopping Center in the city.
According to the Irish Times, Judge Brian J McGovern has granted an injuction to the landlords of the shopping center preventing their continued locking.
Dunnes Stores disabled the automatic doors leading from its shop located at Edward Square Shopping Center in June last, due to what it called ‘operational issues’.
Mr Justice Brian J McGovern said the doors had operated normally over the past 15 years as a means of access – and he granted center landlords Camiveo Limited an injuction preventing their locking.
He said that if the automatic opening mechanism remained disabled, a technician could be found to open them immediately.
In a reserved judgement, he said it appeared that the doors were designed and intended to be the main entrance-exit to the center.
Judge McGovern was satisfied that as the anchor tenant, Dunnes Stores was obliged to keep the doors open when it was trading for the benefit of other retailers in the shopping center, and created connectivity between different parts of the city.
Dunnes had shown evidence that it would be unfairly inconvenienced by making the doors available to all customers until the final decision of the dispute – while the landlord had shown that its other tenants had been affected by the door closure.
The injunction will continue until the full hearing of the substantive trial of the issues regarding the doors between Dunnes and landlords Camiveo.