Glenageary 140-apartment scheme faces local opposition

Redrock plan is second attempt to build on site at Glenageary roundabout

Plans by Keith Craddock’s Redrock Glenageary for a seven-storey, 140-unit apartment scheme for Glenageary in south Dublin are facing local opposition.

Mr Craddock’s Redrock application is a renewed attempt to build on the site after An Bord Pleanála in April 2022 refused planning permission for a 147-unit build-to-rent Strategic Housing Development (SHD). That plan had also been opposed locally.

The new Large Scale Residential Development (LRD) scheme at the junction of Sallynoggin Road and Glenageary Avenue at Glenageary roundabout would include a neighbourhood centre that would have commercial and retail units, a public plaza and a childcare facility.

Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council has received 36 submissions concerning the new proposal.

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In its submission, the Bellevue, Glenageary and Rochestown Residents Association told the council that there were those, particularly from the nearby Sallynoggin cottages, who fervently believed that the proposed development “remains too large, too overbearing and too intrusive”.

Local resident Moira O’Malley said: “Developers should not be allowed to overpopulate this area simply for the means of profit, when it is the community that has to live with the consequences.”

Ms O’Malley said she hoped “the hundreds of voices objecting to this development” would be heard and considered, and that permission would be refused.

“This may be a landmark site; however, an uninspiring and unimaginative apartment block that would be more suitable for the IFSC aesthetically cheapens the area rather than enriching it,” she added.

Former environment editor with The Irish Times Frank McDonald has also lodged a submission opposing the scheme.

Mr McDonald told the council that nobody who believed in proper planning and sustainable development could deny that there was a need for greater density in urban areas to curb ex-urban sprawl.

He added: “But this objective cannot be achieved at any price by permitting high-rise eruptions on a random basis.”

Mr McDonald also argued it was premature to grant planning permission in advance of preparing the Sallynoggin Local Area Plan. He described the proposal as “overbearing due to its height, massing and excessive density”.

In a planning report lodged with the new application, planning consultant Brock McClure said that at the outset it was the applicant’s full intention to address the reasons for refusal in the previous scheme.

It noted that “careful attention has been given to the protection of the existing levels of amenity afforded to the surrounding properties”.

Gordon Deegan

Gordon Deegan

Gordon Deegan is a contributor to The Irish Times