Dublin City Council has granted planning permission for a third pedestrian bridge over the river Liffey.
The bridge, located close to the International Financial Services Centre in the city's docklands area, will also be able to swing open to allow water traffic through.
Costing €3.5 million, the bridge is part of the Dublin Docklands Development Authority's (DDDA) regeneration plans, and is designed to link the Government and cultural area around Merrion Square with the International Financial Services Centre in the Custom House Docks.
While the DDDA is the planning authority in relation to much of the docklands area, it has no jurisdiction on the quays on the south side. As a result, planning permission, which was granted yesterday,was required from Dublin City Council.
Last Christmas, Irish architecture firm Brian O'Halloran and Associates, along with engineers O'Connor Sutton Cronin, won an international competition to design and build the bridge. The design was chosen from more than 80 entries.
The bridge, which will be located some 300 metres downriver from the Matt Talbot Bridge, will be suspension in design and capable of swivelling around two "cradles" to create a 46-metre opening for ships travelling upriver. It will span the Liffey from the Mariners' memorial at City Quay to Stack A, a 19th-century warehouse on the Custom House Docks site, which is to be developed as a retail and trade exhibition centre.
The new pedestrian bridge will be the third new bridge over the river Liffey in the last five years, bringing to 16 the number spanning the Liffey in Dublin city. In 2000, the Millennium Bridge, the first pedestrian bridge since the Ha'penny Bridge opened in 1817, was unveiled.
In June of this year, the James Joyce Bridge opened, linking Blackhall Place with Ushers Island, the setting for Joyce's short story, The Dead.
Safety fears were raised when children began climbing its dramatic arch soon after it opened. A spokesman for Dublin City Council said that bridge was now under 24-hour surveillance from a fixed camera.