Will residents object to David Doyle’s Mount Merrion plans?

In spite of consistently strong local opposition in Mount Merrion, developers do not seem deterred from applying for new schemes around this pricey locale. The latest brave individual to step up to the plate is Shrewsbury Road resident David Doyle, son of the late hotelier PV Doyle. He plans to redevelop the grounds of his late parents' home Thornhill House, off the Cherrygarth estate, a quiet residential estate developed by the hotelier on Thornhill's lands decades ago.

As reported here last year, Doyle acquired the property from his family at the bottom of the market in 2012, for €2 million. However, that price may have been for the main house and only a portion of its lands, with additional funds paid for the remainder of its 1.39-hectare site.

The elegant property was previously advertised for rent at €7,000 a month, but plans to develop 47 additional dwellings on its grounds have now been revealed. The majority of units proposed, 33, are apartments, comprising three one-bed, 24 two-bed and six three-bed apartments with basement parking built below. The remaining 14 units will be large family homes, consisting of nine five-beds and five four-beds. Some 78 parking spaces and 55 bicycle spaces are to be provided in total.

Thornhill House is located directly opposite 2 Cherrygarth, a detached house that was acquired by New Generation Homes to gain access to its substantial Oatlands Monastery site. The duo behind New Generation, Greg Kavanagh and Pat Crean, have since gone their separate ways, while plans to demolish the house and to construct 63 properties on the larger site were rejected by planners and strongly contested by locals, with about 200 objections lodged against the scheme.

Around the corner at the Union Cafe site, developer Oakmount, headed up by Paddy McKillen jnr and Matt Ryan, also came under fire last year from Mount Merrion's residents when they applied for permission for a large mixed-use scheme. In all, there were 336 objections to their plans, likely making it the most hotly contested application of 2016 in the Dún-Laoghaire Rathdown area.

With David Doyle’s application now submitted, Around the Block has little doubt that the residents of Cherrygarth and wider Mount Merrion will, once again, have no shortage of opinions regarding the proposals. Watch this space.