Daft Property - Irish Property News

PLANNING AND THE RING OF KERRY: YOU CAN almost hear Jackie Healy-Rae saying it – “the plannin’ is terrible round here”... What some Kerry people mean by this, of course, is not that the landscape has been chewed up by haphazard housing, but that it can be damned difficult to get permission to build in certain areas. The stark statistics do not bear this out. Altogether, there are at least 34,000 one-off houses in the countryside, accounting for more than half of Kerry’s housing stock or seven per kilometre of public road. That’s an awful lot of houses strewn around the landscape of a county that was recently voted the “most scenic” in Ireland. Kerry’s senior planner Paul Stack has been outspoken about the “incredible damage” done by the proliferation of housing. After an absence of 14 years, he “couldn’t believe what I came back to, planning went out of control”. “It’s like the Celtic Tiger – we knew we were wrong and we kept going,” he told councillors in July. “Eighty per cen...

Building ban on rezoned land leaves taxpayer with huge bill... THE taxpayer will be forced to pick up the tab as councils ban housing on massive banks of land -- bought for billions by property speculators at the height of the boom. The value of development sites has plummeted by more than 90pc, after councils rezoned land which is no longer needed for housing. The Irish Independent has learned that 12 of the country's 34 local authorities have already dezoned or banned development on lands. The remainder will do so by the end of the year, under a radical shake-up of planning system countrywide. But the move will have serious implications for taxpayers. Banks lent billions for speculative deals on those lands which have since collapsed -- with the State now forced to pick up the bill. Housing will now no longer be allowed to be built on 8,000 hectares previously earmarked for development in 12 local authorities alone. At the height of the boom, this land could have sold f...

The property bubble floats once again on the Fringe of 'Liffeytown' ONE OF the more esoteric events of the Absolut Fringe Festival will be artist Fergal McCarthy’s Liffeytown . From September 12th to 26th, 11 temporary red and green structures will be floating in the River Liffey, between the Ha’penny Bridge and O’Connell Bridge. If they look familiar to you, that’s because at some time you’ve probably played with tiny versions of the Monopoly houses and hotels they resemble. McCarthy got the idea from the “craziness of the development and lack of planning at the height of the boom, when apartment blocks were being built all over the city, particularly in the Liberties, where I was living at the time. It was a time of disposable architecture, with no vision or longevity,” he says. It was also a time during which it seemed as if the planners, if they could have built on water, would have done so. Now McCarthy is planning to do just that, with his river-based installation. “The L...

Land rezoned for 800,000 more homes than needed... Glut highlights role councillors played in fuelling the boom. COUNCILS have rezoned enough land to build almost 800,000 new homes that the country does not need, an Irish Independent investigation has found. Local authorities have rezoned enough land to construct almost 1.1 million houses and apartments across the country at a time when thousands of homes lie empty in 'ghost estates'. But official projections received by the Government have found fewer than 300,000 new units are needed between now and 2016. The revelation highlights the extent of the role councillors and planners have played in fuelling the property boom which collapsed with devastating consequences. Some councils including Meath rezoned up to 60 times more land for residential use than was needed. Just two out of 34 councils -- Limerick and North Tipperary -- under-zoned land. Councils who designated too much land for housing will now be forced by the Governme...

The Plans That Crashed To Earth... The Celtic Tiger has come and gone and the skyline of our capital city remains much the same. What happened to the skyscrapers that the 'starchitects' were supposed to bring... They were supposed to symbolise the new Ireland, a collection of skyscrapers and internationally renowned buildings that would illustrate to the world the global hub that the country, and in particular Dublin, had become. In the end, they were never built, with some left firmly at ground level as the economy crashed and the myth of Ireland's national wealth was exposed. In other cases, the planners decided against high rise, while a combination of An Bord Pleanála and significant opposition from well-to-do residents of areas like Ballsbridge has seen other plans turned down. This was Celtic Tiger Ireland and it was a new place, some of us said, with new ideas and a new way of looking of things. The housing boom had made most of us appear better off (even if it was ...

The 210 apartments in the nine-storey Gasworks building, in Ringsend near Landstown - Dublin 4, have been vacant since they went on sale two years ago. Developer Liam Carroll has since got the OK to convert the Gasworks apartments into a 520-bed hotel. However local residents are saying "no" to the plans and have appealed the proposal. Their main concern seems to be they will have to pay for the upkeep of common areas - hotel guests will not etc. The original promotion of the apartments, 2 years ago, by Hooke & Mac Donald mentioned: ...One of the most interesting and significant residential projects ever to be carried out in Dublin was launched on the market... A familiar feature of the South Dublin skylinehas been transformed. The striking metal cylinder of the former gasholder at Barrow Street creates a frame within which a stunning new nine storey block of large two bedroom apartments has been built. The curves of the building complemented by its dramatic glass fa...