A major new docklands development is planned opposite the entrance to the new port tunnel in Dublin. Jack Fagan, Property Editor, reports
Another new neighbourhood is about to be created in the Dublin docklands with the lodging of a planning application for a huge mixed use development including a 19-storey tower block near the Point Depot.
Merchants Gate, the €400 million regeneration project on a site of almost nine acres opposite the entrance to the new port tunnel off East Wall Road will include 721 apartments, a four-star hotel with 200 bedrooms (already approved by the planners), a 20-suite boutique hotel, 38,000sqm (409,000 sq ft) of mainly offices, and community-based uses including social and affordable housing, a gym, swimming-pool, restaurants, neighbourhood shopping, community care centre and crèche.
It is expected that up to 5,000 people will live and work in the new neighbourhood which will have a total floor area of 102,000sqm (1,100,000 sq ft).
Merchants Gate will be one of the largest developments in the docklands and will be strategically located beside the exit from the new port tunnel as well as the Eastlink Bridge and the LUAS service.
Christopher Bennett, who is to develop the complex in a joint venture with businessman Patrick Oman, said he expected that Merchants Gate would act as a key gateway to the city , particularly for traffic from the new port tunnel. The 19-storey tower block "will create a spectacular entrance to the city . . . there will be the wow factor just like high rise buildings in New York or Chicago".
He said he was confident of getting permission for the tower because the Dublin Docklands Development Authority had identified an area close to the Point Depot for a high rise block.
However, the planning application for Merchants Gate will be decided on by Dublin City Council's planners rather than the DDDA. Mr Bennett said that in their meetings with the city planners they had been supportive of the scheme and had persuaded them to "tame down" some parts of it.
As well as the area around the proposed Point village, the DDDA has also earmarked sites at the planned Grand Canal Station and at Britain Quay, where the river Dodder joins the Liffey, for 60-metre landmark towers. The one at Britain Quay will be partially used as a recording studio for U2 and like the other buildings, will stand 60 metres high, similar in height to Liberty Hall.
Three different architectural firms (Burke Kennedy Doyle, Michael Collins & Associates and Anthony Reddy and Associates) have been engaged to provide a diversity of styles in Merchants Gate which will have eight different blocks.
The site for the development has been assembled over 20 years and has been used by Rathborne Candles, brick merchants, car sales and warehousing. New streets running through the site will have the potential to either link up with adjoining developments or to the existing Merchant's Road.
The promoters say that provision of retail facilities in the ground floor of many of the buildings should help to enliven the area.
The tower block will be the centre-piece of the development and will be located at the apex of the site. It is planned to step down the building as it approaches Merchant's Place and to provide balconies and roof gardens along the frontage.
Mr Bennett's company, Bennett (Construction) Ltd, has been a major player in urban regeneration projects in the city for many years.
Its projects have included two blocks in the IFSC (Guild House and Commerzbank), Ballymun Civic Centre, Heuston Station refurbishment and CHQ (formerly known as Stack A), Ballymun Civic Centre and The Helix at DCU.
