Pavilion lodges final plans for Dun Laoghaire scheme

Pavilion Leisure Complex, the company which is redeveloping the former Pavilion Cinema and gardens in Dun Laoghaire, has lodged multiple planning applications for final alterations to the scheme.

The alterations involve the inclusion of a swimming-pool in the leisure element of the development with minor changes to the retail units fronting on to the area known as the Metals, at Queen's Road.

The DART line, which is some 20 feet below the Metals at this location, is to be covered between the traffic lights and the Queens Road entrance to the Marine Hotel, providing a landscaped plaza area in front of the stores.

The alterations, which are mostly minor, include a new restaurant within the existing shell of the leisure facility with a shopfront to the Metals with illuminated signage. There is also an application for a 125 sq m extension to the Meadows and Byrne unit and modification of existing retail units 1 and 2 to form a single food service retail unit.

The apartment, leisure and retail development - which is to include a 350-seat public theatre - is due to be completed early next year at a cost expected to be about £24 million. According to a spokesman, Tim McCormack, the development will give new focus to the centre of Dun Laoghaire, creating a mix of urban facilities with the village-like atmosphere of the town.

The location on the waterfront, overlooking the port with magnificent views of Dublin Bay and the mountains, is a good one and, as the advertising blurb enthuses, the views of the sea from the restaurant/ bar area are "views that change with the weather, the seasons and the time of day". Whatever about that, the close proximity of public transport, including the DART, means the Pavilion is likely to become a fashionable address.

The pavilion scheme is a public private partnership, the land and planning permission being granted to Pavilion Leisure Complex Limited in return for the theatre and other public elements. Such a deal had been planned over a period of 20 years, first by Dun Laoghaire Corporation and then Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. Permission was initially granted in 1995 and after a number of applications for amendments, notably to the height and number of the apartments, construction began in 1998.

Always controversial, the scheme involved the loss of the former Victorian Square, as well as the ruined cinema which was closed in the 1970s. A previous scheme which was the subject of many attempted deals with private enterprise, was a planetarium. In 1994, the manager of the then new Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, Kevin O'Sullivan, told the councillors that "you could play football on the streets of Dun Laoghaire at night", an indication of the lack of commercial activity in the town.

The deal with Pavilion Leisure Complex was agreed by the councillors by 23 votes to 2 at a meeting on March 27th, 1995, but a dispute held up development. Clearance of the site finally got under way in 1997 and work began in 1998. The project is being seen very much as a flagship development for the area.