Development plans lodged for south Lucan

Three years after the Government designated lands at Adamstown in south Lucan as a Strategic Development Zone (SDZ), the first planning application for 448 houses has been lodged with South Dublin County Council.

Castlethorn Construction is looking to build a mix of two-bed duplexes and apartments and three and four-bed terraced homes which have been designed by O'Mahony Pike.

Lands at Adamstown are owned by three Irish companies: Castlethorn, Maplewood Developments and Tierra Limited which formed a joint venture company Chartridge Developments.

Castlethorn, which is controlled by Joe O'Reilly, Liam Maye, John Fitzsimons and Brian Wallace, bought a two-third segment of the land in 1996-1997 by Castlethorn for €30 million, just before it was rezoned.

The masterplan for the 550-acre lands shows a suburban development of up to three stories, rising to four stories on the main boulevard. It envisages a diverse range of up to 10,000 houses close to amenities with a public transport system with feeder buses, two QBCs, cycling routes and a new train station on the Dublin-Kildare line with a capacity of 3,000.

The plan also involves a new shopping area, a fire station, offices, light industry, four new schools and community and leisure centres.

Strategic Development Zones were introduced under Part IX of the Planning and Development Act 2000 to fast track residential development.

Adamstown is the first SDZ - the others are a 94-acre tranche in Clonmagadden valley in Navan, Co Meath and Castaheaney/Hansfield in south-west Blanchardstown.

With SDZs planning applications are decided upon within two months by the planning authority whose decision is final, so there can be no referral to An Bord Pleanála.

It is estimated that around 25,000 people will ultimately live in this part of south Lucan.

There has been widespread local opposition to the plan. Residents fear a Ballymun-flats-revisited situation where vast estates will be thrown up and SDZs will ultimately be powerless to force agencies like Iarnród Éireann, Bus Éireann and the Department of Education and Science to provide the necessary infrastructure.

Its success is dependent on a complex jigsaw falling into place and the co-operation of planners, developers and the State.

South Dublin County Council has responded that developers will not be able to proceed to the next phase of development if they have not completed the necessary infrastructure.

A second application will be lodged shortly in respect of the Adamstown Link Road, which will be a key element of road infrastructure for the locality.

This application will be made by Chartridge Developments Ltd. It will entail the construction of a 2km single carriageway and bus-lane in each direction linking Adamstown to the Outer Ring Road which is currently being built.

According to the masterplan, the bulk of the infrastructure should be in place by the end of phase five of an overall 13-phase development.