Retail developers have no doubt been analysing the new Strategic Planning Guidelines for the Greater Dublin area to figure out what they will mean for the provision of new shopping facilities to serve a fast-growing population with increasing spending power.

The guidelines, drawn up by a team of consultants led by Brady Shipman Martin, were bound to deal with the thorny issue of where major shopping facilities should be located in the Dublin and Mid-East regions (including Meath, Kildare and Wicklow), given that more retail floor space is apparently required.

Commissioned by the two regional authorities and overseen by a steering committee representing them and the seven local authorities in the Greater Dublin area, the new guidelines will be given statutory effect in a Planning Bill due within months; what this means is that they will have to be taken into account.

Perhaps the most important statement in the guidelines relates to major out-of-town shopping centres, such as Liffey Valley. The development of very large, regional-scale retail malls or superstores on greenfield sites or outside established centres is not regarded as sustainable and proposals for these should be resisted.

This virtual embargo on new out-of-town shopping centres linked to the motorway network is expected to be underpinned by a revised set of policy guidelines on retail development, due to be issued shortly by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey. These will replace his interim ban on superstores above 3,000 sq m.

The Strategic Planning Guidelines say the effect of this floor space ceiling will increase the number of convenience outlets required and preclude the development of very large hypermarkets and similar developments that would generate high levels of traffic movement and possibly threaten existing centres.

As the consultants see it, major retail facilities to serve Tallaght and Blanchardstown are substantially in place. However, they say additional provision will be required to serve Lucan/ Clondalkin, over and above the Liffey Valley centre, as well as Swords, which is designated as a new growth centre.

The Strategic Planning Guidelines also provide for further retail development at a limited number of existing nodes within the built-up area, such as Blackrock, Bray, Dundrum and Dun Laoghaire. But they say such centres should only be allowed to develop if this did not constitute a threat to the city centre.

Broadly, additional convenience goods floor space requirements should be distributed in line with additional population growth, according to the consultants. And because shopping centres are major traffic generators, they say priority should be given to convenience goods sites served by public transport.

According to the guidelines, the predominance of Dublin city centre for commercial and retailing activity is likely to continue. In recent years, it had seen the development of increased levels of retail services such as restaurants and the further development of high order, specialist retail outlets. This trend is likely to continue.

The consultants say the upgrading of comparison shopping in the city centre is likely be accompanied by a decline in its significance for lower cost clothing, footwear and other comparison goods - now widely available at suburban centres - and for bulky household durables now increasingly sold in retail warehouses.

The trend towards retail warehousing is likely to continue, they say. Future provision of retail warehousing should be located at accessible points on the road network that are also served by public transport, according to the guidelines.

They suggest that the need for additional comparison floor space outside the city centre provides an opportunity to strengthen the role of other centres, including designated development centres in Dublin's hinterland, such as Navan, as well as selected nodes within the metropolitan area in line with the overall strategy.

Other hinterland towns designated as primary development centres are Balbriggan, Wicklow and Naas-Newbridge-Kilcullen, with Kildare-Monasterevin, Athy and Rush-Lusk listed as secondary development centres. These areas will need more shopping facilities as their populations expand over the next 12 years.

The guidelines envisage only limited further development in the north Kildare towns of Leixlip, Celbridge, Maynooth and Kilcock. However, they suggest that it would be desirable to develop one of these towns to provide a level of comparison shopping sufficient to reduce dependency on centres outside the area - such as Liffey Valley.

Within the metropolitan area, which extends from just south of Rush to Greystones and westwards to Kilcock, the strategy aims to consolidate the existing built-up area, with further development being permitted in Swords and the Bray-Greystones-Delgany area of north Wicklow. More retail space will be needed to cater for them.

Here again, the guidelines emphasise the need for a coherent policy. Thus, while further development of comparison shopping is envisaged for several locations , the level of growth at these centres should not be allowed to threaten the city centre and it will be important to monitor the development of retailing closelyin this regard.

They also say that consideration might be given to the creation of an additional shopping precinct within the city centre, located in the general Docklands area and served by the proposed new rail link east of the loop line connecting the planned DART station at Barrow Street, on the south side, with Spencer Dock.

Throughout, the Strategic Planning Guidelines stress the need to reduce the growth in demand for travel in the Greater Dublin area, now manifesting itself in unprecedented levels of traffic congestion. Thus, sites served by existing or future public transport are seen to have the edge over sites on the motorway network.

Perhaps mindful of the tailbacks of traffic generated by the Blanchardstown and Liffey Valley shopping centres, the guidelines insist that further development of major retail facilities should be located at suitable and accessible sites, but not on the national road network - too late, however, to save the M50.