A south Dublin golf facility has been saved from redesignation for future housing, following a vote of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Councillors of all parties against the proposal.
The council’s executive had urged councillors to support a proposal to identify the Stepaside Golf Centre and Jamestown Pitch and Putt Course as “long-term strategic and sustainable settlement sites” in the county development plan.
The owner of both golf facilities and several hundred locals had made submissions to the council opposing the move. Rosa Roe, whose family owns the facilities, said she had “no intention” of redeveloping the lands. Some locals branded the proposals as “shameful” and an “outrage”, with others saying they show an “abhorrent disregard” for local amenities and would “destroy the very fabric of the area”.
The lands at the edge of the Dublin Mountains are currently zoned for amenity and agricultural use, and although the council’s plan would not have immediately changed that zoning, it would have put the golf facilities into a category which “may deliver housing” in the future.
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The proposed redesignation followed an edict last summer from Minister for Housing James Browne that local authorities must rezone significant additional land to help tackle the housing crisis.
Two council motions opposing the redesignation were last week proposed by Fine Gael’s Pierce Dargan and a number of other Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Independent councillors, and Labour’s Lettie McCarthy. Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour, Green Party, People Before Profit and Independent Councillors all voted in support of either the first or second motion.
Dargan said he wanted to do everything he could to “try and safeguard this amazing public amenity” that “provides so much community benefit to everyone who is from Kilternan and Stepaside”.
The owners had “come out publicly and said they want to maintain their family business, and that would be jeopardised by putting it into the land bank”.
McCarthy asked the council to “please not allow an invasion on the virgin lands of the Dublin Mountains to take place”.
The local area had seen “unprecedented development”, she said. “Enough is enough, give this Kilternan area a little bit of breathing space.”
She noted that the area surrounding the lands lacked adequate school or creche spaces, sewage or water facilities, adequate cycling or public transport infrastructure, or a public park.
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Senior planner Louise McGauran said the redesignation reflected that the land “may deliver housing within the subsequent development plans”, and this gave infrastructure providers such as Uisce Éireann “that lead in time required to service the sites”.
The next development plan post-2028 would last for 10 years, she said, and the redesignation “gives us that ability to signpost those areas we are potentially looking at in the 10-year plan, and we will have to zone for a significant number of housing units in that 10-year plan”.
