Dublin to get 40,000 new homes

More than 40,000 new homes will be completed in Dublin city by 2010 in an eight-year building programme attempting to reverse the problem of urban sprawl.

The new homes are to be provided in developments around Heuston Station on the city's western approach; in the markets area of the north inner city; on the city's north fringe where there is to be a new railway station and major recreational facility; in Pelletstown; and in the city's docklands.

The move will further reinforce a turn-around in the population of Dublin city which had declined from 250,000 people in the 1920s to just 76,000 people in 1999.

From 1991, however, Dublin city has seen something of a resurgence, with an increase of 38 per cent in the number of people living there up to 2002.

In outlining the turn-around, the city manager, Mr John Fitzgerald, said more than €1 billion had been invested in integrated area plans, and while some schemes - such as those for St Michael's Estate in Inchicore - had attracted unfavourable headlines, the aim was to end "ghettoisation" in large local authority estates and provide a better social mix of private and social housing.

The move also involved good quality design for urban living spaces, with social facilities such as transport and services being "front-loaded".

The change in planning, design and facilities was a "seismic shift" from what was par for the course 10 years ago, and Mr Fitzgerald insisted that Dublin had achieved more in "10 years of catch-up, than many cities had achieved in 10 times that long".

Under the new housing strategy now adopted by the Strategic Planning Guidelines for the Greater Dublin Area, a two-pronged "antidote to sprawl" will consist of a slowing down of housing development in the outer fringes of the Greater Dublin Area as well as more than doubling the number of new homes in Dublin city.

Mr Fitzgerald said "a lot of damage has been done" by the drift of commuter housing into surrounding counties.

While this had worked for some people, he believed it was for many "far away from where people would have wanted to live".

New developments would include the city's north fringe where a new train station was planned on the Malahide line, and major recreational facilities based on Fr Collins Park.

In the north inner city markets area, the existing markets would be a "new magnet" with planned commercial and retail development, and landmark apartment complexes of about six storeys.

The docklands would also continue to be developed, as would Pelletstown and the western approach to the city around Heuston Station.

The city council housisng estimate includes some starts dating back to 2002. It suggests that the total new housing output - much of it apartments - will rise from a current level of more than 2,000 units a year to more than 5,000 a year.