Sir, – The unaffordable rents and house prices that aspiring homeowners and renters in Dublin face, along with severely restricted housing choice, are well documented.
One key driver of this plight is the combined impact of the building heights guidelines and build to rent guidelines published in 2018.
It is a well-established fact that the high-rise apartment blocks mandated by the building heights directive involve a level of construction costs which make them unaffordable, and the taller the development, the more unaffordable.
Alongside their unaffordability, these high-rise buildings fail seriously in relation to their environmental impact. Both in their construction, and through the high level of their embodied carbon costs across their lifetime (unregulated in Ireland), these high-rise apartment buildings are considerably less environmentally efficient than lower buildings.
:fill(white):background_color(white)/static.themebuilder.aws.arc.pub/irishtimes/1647534191476.png)
Against the background of the forthcoming Climate Action Plan, it is indeed troubling, if the media hints are accurate that suggest the Government may intend subventing this high-rise model rather than replacing it.
The almost complete dominance of the build to rent model in Dublin suburbs offers high-rise one-bed and two-bed apartment developments across the county, with reduced standards for aspects such as storage, dual-aspect windows, at unaffordable rents, and with virtually no three-bed units that can enable a family to put down roots in a community over its life course, and no requirement for universal design standard homes that enable older people to “age in place”, in line with Government policy.
In cities across the world, citizens are rejecting high-rise living for its poor livability, restrictions on community and neighbourhood, and impacts on mental and physical health. The “missing middle”, of low- or mid-rise high-density housing, with a diversity of sizes and tenures of homes, is more and more being recognised as capable of delivering all the critical aspects of urban 21st-century housing, including this Government’s legitimate policy objectives – compact development, high density, affordability, reasonable profit levels, ownership and rental options, livability and environmental sustainability – and is taking the place of high-rise vertical sprawl. Forward-looking architects in Ireland are espousing and promoting this model.
The Government has the opportunity now in its eagerly awaited housing strategy Homes for All to bring forward policies that will turn away from the high-rise unaffordable and unsustainable model for Dublin and other cities. Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien has the option of espousing new thinking on approaches to urban housing – approaches that will promote neighbourhood, diverse communities and affordability in compact, low- and mid-rise high density and sustainable developments, while still yielding a profit for the developer and ultimately reducing Government subventions for unaffordable development.
The Government’s choices are real, and the quality of life of future generations of city dwelling citizens depends on those choices.
What legacy does the Government wish to leave? We wait to see and hope for the best. – Yours, etc,
Cllr ANNE COLGAN,
(Independent),
Ballinteer,
Dublin 16.