Carlton site permission gets five-year extension

Developers behind a €1.25 billion shopping complex planned for

O'Connell Street in Dublin have been given until 2022 to build the scheme that includes the demolition of most of the east side of Moore Street.

Dublin City Council has extended permission for the Dublin Central development ahead of an appeal by the State of a court order protecting Moore Street as a 1916 “battlefield site”.

In 2010, developer Joe O’Reilly’s Chartered Land was granted planning permission for the complex on a site stretching from the former Carlton cinema on O’Connell Street to Moore Street. Construction has not started and the permission was due to expire next year.

Last March High Court judge Max Barrett ordered the protection of nearly all of the buildings on the east side of the street as well as the laneways leading to it.

Mr Justice Barrett declared the buildings, some of which date from the mid-20th century, a 1916 Rising battlefield site that collectively constitute a national monument.

Colm Moore, a nominee of the 1916 Relatives Association, took the case against the Minister for Arts and Heritage to extend national monument status to all Moore Street buildings linked to the Rising.

Ruling appealed

The High Court decision would make the Dublin Central development unimplementable. However, the Government last month decided to appeal the ruling following advice from the Attorney General.

A number of Government departments and agencies had expressed serious concerns about the potential implications of the judgment for planning and development nationally.

The designation of sites, instead of buildings as national monuments is understood to be of particular concern as it has the potential to set a precedent which could affect a wide range of infrastructure projects.

In a report on its decision to extend the planning permission, the council said it accepted there had been economic considerations that meant the development had not been viable since it was granted permission, and that there had been no changes to the city development plan that would prevent the development going ahead in the coming years.

Planning Act

The council said while it was necessary for it to “give due consideration” to the judgments of the High Court, judgments would only be taken into account if they affected certain provisions of the Planning Act, which the council had determined, were not affected in this instance.

The plans approved for Dublin Central, which will be 12 years old by the time the planning extension expires, proposed 82 retail units including a large anchor store (the developers had previously hoped to attract British department store John Lewis to the site), as well as 22 apartments, 300,000sq metres (3,230,000sq ft) of office space and 14 restaurants in a complex up to six storeys high.

The designs excluded the demolition of four houses on the street, Nos 14-17, which were designated national monuments in 2007, but proposed the demolition of “all other buildings, other than the protected structures and facades and national monuments”.

UK property group Hammerson last month secured ownership of a number of Chartered Land assets, including the Carlton site, but Chartered Land has an option to retake a 50 per cent stake in the site by June 1st next year.