Trinity College to lodge plans for 358-unit student accommodation

Trinity College, Dublin (TCD) has given notice that it intends to lodge fresh plans for an eight-storey, 358-unit, student accommodation scheme for Dartry in Dublin 6.

An Bord Pleanála previously granted Trinity the go-ahead for the scheme at Trinity Hall in August, 2020 despite local residents' complaints over alleged late night, drunken rowdy behaviour by students.

However, after a local resident, Patricia Kenny of Temple Road, Dartry, challenged the decision in the High Court, the appeals board consented in February last year to the High Court quashing the planning permission and to a costs order in the case.

Plan

Now, almost two years after first lodging the original plan, Trinity has given notice of resubmitting “fast track” plans for the student scheme in the coming days with An Bord Pleanála.

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“Many Trinity students are currently competing with renters for increasingly scarce affordable rental accommodation in Dublin,” a spokeswoman for Trinity College said on Tuesday:

“This proposed expansion of Trinity’s student housing offering in Dartry would free up the equivalent of approximately 100 rental homes that would otherwise be needed by students, ” she said.

The lodging of the Strategic Housing Development plan is set to reignite the planning row, with a number of locals strongly opposed to the scheme. It involves the demolition of Cunningham House and a sports hall to be replaced by four connected blocks in a rectangular layout with one block reaching eight storeys in height.

The previous plan was opposed by a number of local residents who alleged that drunken students leaving the existing student residence urinate, vomit, scream and shout.

Scheme

In response to the previous scheme, residents of Temple Road, Dartry, Martin and Mary Thornton alleged that the students' "drunken and disorderly behaviours including singing and screaming at the top of their voices, drinking and urinating in public, smashing glass bottles and walking in the centre of the road with total disregard for their own or others' safety".

However, the board inspector in the case, Lorraine Dockery said that "many of the matters raised in relation of anti-social behaviour/disruption/littering within the public realm are a matter for An Garda Síochána, and are outside the remit of this planning application".

“Trinity Hall management have extensive experience in managing the existing complex and I am satisfied that the issue of student management can be adequately dealt with by means of condition, ” she said.