Five acres at Airfield Estate rezoned from residential to amenity

Councillors in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown last night agreed to rezone five acres of residential land at Airfield Estate, an urban farm near Dundrum in south Dublin.

The process involves varying the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown county development plan to rezone the estate from residential to open space and amenity.

The variation is designed to protect the estate from further development, and will go to public consultation before it is finalised. The remainder of the estate is already zoned amenity.

Previous attempts to rezone the five acres which run parallel to the Luas line were rejected.

This was partly due to a need for an equivalent amount of land to be zoned for residential development elsewhere to balance out the housing needs of the area.

However, last night director of planning Michael Gough told councillors that there would not be a need for "compensatory equivalent upzoning" due to the permitted high residential densities in the nearby Sandyford Industrial Estate.

Last year the trustees of the estate sold 3.5 acres known as Dudley's Field. The land, which runs alongside the Wyckham bypass extension, was sold for over €16 million. It is currently zoned open space and amenity.

The councillors also agreed to begin the process to vary the county plan to accommodate the proposed University College Dublin campus development plan.

The campus plan requires that additional objectives be added to the county development plan to allow for "cultural, community and retail facilities, offices, hotel and student accommodation and transport facilities".