Docks authority charged with renewed port area

THE Government has decided to set up a Dublin Docklands Development Authority, with overall responsibility for rejuvenating the city's redundant port area, including the Custom House Docks.

Work is also to begin on the preparation of a master plan to provide "a coherent and integrated approach to the physical, economic, tourism, employment, traffic and social concerns of the area", according to the Minister for Finance.

The area covers 1,300 acres on both sides of the river Liffey. On the south side, it stretches from Butt Bridge to the Poolbeg power station, and on the north from Amiens Street to East Wall Road.

Mr Quinn emphasised that the establishment of the docklands anthority, incorporating the Custom House Docks Development Authority (CHDDA), "does not affect the designation or operation of the Custom House Docks area as the International Financial Services Centre".

As reported in The Irish Times on April 25th, the Dublin docklands Area Task Force comes out against extending the remit of the CHDDA to the overall area because its "fast track" model, exempt from the normal planning process, meant that it suffered a democratic deficit.

In a weekend statement marking the publication of the task force report, Mr Quinn said the questions of tax incentives, funding and expenditure implications would be examined in the preparation of the master plan.

The size of the area meant that any package of incentives decided on by the Government "would have to be targeted" because of the danger that an undifferentiated package could be self defeating.

"There is no question of blanket designation of the entire area for tax incentive purposes, the task force says.

Pending the establishment of the new authority, work on preparing the master plan will be initiated under the general supervision of the task force by a project team to be set up by the Custom House Docks Development Authority.

Mr Quinn, one of the area's Dail deputies, said the master plan is expected to be completed "within about a year". But some of the individual studies proposed in the report - such as the need for interim environmental improvements - would be finished sooner.