I have made an observation on the draft Dunsink Local Area Plan. It’s main points:

• Luas should be delivered along with housing, not after.
• The proposal to delay the light rail line until long after extensive housing is provided is contrary to the principles of Transport-oriented Development and inconsistent with the Regional Spatial and Economic Strategy.
• The assessment of alternatives in the Strategic Environmental Assessment is not meaningful and does not comply with the requirements of the SEA Directive.
• The proposals in the draft LAP as regards car parking present opportunities for significant economic savings for residents and for major improvements in welfare and the public realm.
• The proposed combined light rail and cycle/pedestrian bridge over the M50, consistent with the relevant provisions of the Fingal Development Plan, is very welcome.
• The alteration of River Road to a quietway with no through motor traffic requires minimal initial investment and should be implemented as part of, or before, phase 1 of the LAP.
• The land to the west of the Navan Road train station is ideally suited for transport-oriented development and the zoning shoul be changed to the mixed use Metro Rail Economic Corridor to provide housing as well as employment.
• The land to the east of the station includes a large area of wetland. The wetland area should have the development zoning removed from it.

Full details here.

ACP has granted permission for a replacement Deer Park Hotel, following appeals.

The first-party (Tetrarch) appeal against Fingal’s permission was about the refusal of permission for a new road and the extent of car parking.

My (third-party) appeal was about

• the need to do a sustainability analysis of the demolition proposal
• a request for pedestrian permeability conditions in the decision and
• support for the refusal of the road.

At Monday’s meeting the Council agreed to my motion to write to the Minister for Housing to ask that sites with housing planning permissions but which are currently used as car parks no longer be exempted from the Residential Zoned Land Tax.

I became aware of this exemption in the context of the recent Variation to the County Development Plan, where we rezoned green belt and rural land despite the availability of well-located, fully serviced residential land with planning permissions. In the Variation process, I asked for details of the undeveloped sites with planning permission and found that these sites included two on car parking at Blanchardstown Shopping Centre for 1319 apartments, and one on car parking in Santry for 192 apartments.

The owner of the Blanchardstown sites has gone on public record that they are deferring their development of these apartments: “In respect of the permitted Site A and Site B/C permissions, due to current viability challenges, these developments are expected to come forward in the medium term…”

A majority of the Council supported my motion, with one FG councillor voting against and eight councillors abstaining.

More details are in the Dublin Inquirer’s article.

Cllrs. Pádraig McEvoy (Kildare, Independent), Dan Boyle (Cork, Green), and Darragh Moriarty (Dublin, Labour) and I have made a joint response to the public consultation on the Planning Design Standards for Apartments National Planning Statement, 2026.