Mental health hostel concern

Adam Daly

RESIDENTS in Grangegorman have expressed concern over the number of mental health facilities in their area, including a new hostel for men with “severe and enduring” mental health illness.

The HSE recently secured approval for the 10-bedroom hostel in Grangegorman which will provide 24-hour nursing care for men aged between 30-70 who are deemed independent and with no mobility issues.

Grangegorman resident Fiona Fox told Northside People that there are two developments beside her and both will cater for mental health patients. 

‘’It is a residential area, but there has been no balance in terms of what's being developed and that’s the basis to which we objected to it, and we weren't consulted.

‘’There is no proper planning in place by Dublin City Council to give areas like ours some sort of balance between one type of development to another.

‘’We have no overriding protection. A good planning regime should manage different types of developments so that an area does not become overly one thing or another, and more sustainable into the future.’’

Fox resigned as the resident rep on the Grangegorman Development Agency (GDA) community liaison 

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committee two years ago because, she claims, residents were not consulted about developments in the area. 

‘’Where we live, it is a nice area, but if more and more institutional based developments are built in this small area it will spin it in a different direction in the future,” she said. 

The HSE was granted permission by An Bord Pleanála for the hostel at 26-29 Stanhope Terrace on Stanhope Street and plan to relocate residents currently accommodated in Cork Street, Dublin 8, in a building that “exceeds current demands”.

In its original application to Dublin City Council, the HSE said Stanhope Street hostels had opened in the late ‘80s but were closed in 2009 as they were too small and had fallen into disrepair.

The health authority said the houses had been viewed by Dublin City Council but it was decided the buildings, which had been occupied by squatters for a period, weren’t suitable for social housing.

However, residents are angry that they weren’t consulted about the plans and have expressed concerns about the safety of people living nearby.

Former local TD Joe Costello says he has had numerous residents come to his constituency office to complain about the mental health hostel and the lack of communication. 

‘’So what they’re doing here, and what they’re doing without any consultation, is establishing a severe mental health hostel in an area that is totally the wrong place for it, in the confluence of all the school-going children of the area,” he said. 

Costello believes building in the residential area is unnecessary as there is land available on the North Circular Road.

“They have more than adequate space,” he claimed. “They have a 15 acre site that they could build on by the Phoenix centre. But instead they’re demolishing houses down by the bottom of Grangegorman to make way for the hostel’.

An Bord Pleanála ruled that the new hostel was an acceptable use for the site and that it would not have an unacceptable impact on residential amenities in Grangegorman.