Dublin Civic Trust opposes plan to delist 500 buildings

Dublin city councillors have until Friday to make submissions on a new development plan for the city which would take 500 Georgian, Edwardian and Victorian houses off the protected buildings list.

By removing them from the list the council is effectively proposing to sign the death warrant for hundreds of these houses, according to the president of Dublin Civic Trust.

Prof Kevin B. Nolan, who is also vice-president of the Dublin Georgian Society, said a recommendation by the council's planners to delete more than 500 houses from the Record of Protected Structures (RPS) would leave them vulnerable to being "irrevocably damaged".

Councillors have until Friday to make submissions on the proposals in the Draft Development Plan for the city, 2005 to 2011. Three special meetings of the council are then planned, for September 7th, 13th and 23rd, to discuss the Draft Development Plan, including the proposal to delist more than 500 houses. The houses affected are concentrated in Clontarf, Ranelagh, Donnybrook and Rathmines.

Their removal from the RPS would mean works could be carried out on them without the special permission needed if they remained protected. The sort of works include changes to window styles, extensions to porches and some internal refurbishments It would not mean developers could tear them down, however.

The scale of the delisting is "of grave concern", said Prof Nolan. "Why remove so many?" he asked. "And what level of expert advice did the planners seek? It is very worrying."

A number of councillors are known to have already lodged objections to the planners' recommendations including Cllr Mary Freehill of the Labour Party and Sinn Féin's Cllr Killian Forde. Describing the recommendations as a "step backwards in the promotion and retention of Dublin City's historic building heritage", Cllr Forde urged other councillors to reject them.

"I am also calling on the council to carry out a full inventory of some 4,000 remaining Georgian and Edwardian buildings currently not included on the Record of Protected Structures."

Mr Jim Keogan, deputy city planner, said one of the objectives when drafting the city's development plan for the next six years was to review the RPS "to ensure that it includes only structures which fulfil the criteria specified in the Planning and Development Act 2000".

The structures the planners now hope to delist "do not have the necessary special characteristics which would merit their continued inclusion in the record", he said.