Managers urge priority for plans to create more homes

Priority is to be given to major infrastructural schemes over the next 12 months to release land with the potential for an extra…

Priority is to be given to major infrastructural schemes over the next 12 months to release land with the potential for an extra 11,700 homes, according to the managers of Dublin's four local authorities.

Over the next three years, they say, schemes will be implemented to facilitate the construction of a further 54,400 homes. At present, there is enough land already zoned or about to be zoned to accommodate 37,000 units.

The production and distribution of water is seen as "crucial" to the success of this programme, and the report says plans to augment the Ballymore Eustace supply scheme should be speeded up to increase water production to 573 million litres per day.

The report describes a £33 million sewerage scheme for Dublin's north fringe, extending from Ballymun to Baldoyle, as being of "vital strategic importance". However, as this scheme will not be in place until April 2002, it accepts the need for temporary arrangements.

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The Dodder and Lucan/Clondalkin sewerage schemes are also described as being of "critical importance". If they are not moved forward, "it will virtually halt additional development in the county, with consequent severe impacts on the region as a whole".

Several major road schemes are also given priority. However, the report advises the Government that Dublin's future economic prosperity is "wholly dependent" on proper transport - "in particular, a revamped and radically improved public transport system".

With the necessary funding and political will, the four managers, Mr John Fitzgerald (Dublin Corporation); Mr Derek Brady (Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown); Mr William Soffe (Fingal); and Mr Frank Kavanagh (South Dublin), say such a system could be put in place.

The four managers claim some social facilities also need to be financed "in advance of their strict justification on purely economic grounds", adding that the Dublin local authorities have had "unfortunate experience" of the effects of a failure to provide such facilities.