Potential housing boom in Dublin 15

Dunsink has the potential to put a major dent in Dublin’s chronic housing crisis, a Fingal County Council committee meeting heard.

Thursday’s meeting of the Blanchardstown-Mulhuddart/Castleknock/Ongar Area Committee received an update on Fingal County Council’s plan to use council-owned land for housing.

Originally earmarked as part of the 2023-29 Fingal Development Plan, the meeting went into detail about the fields around Churchfield and Dunsink and how the project is proceeding.

The meeting heard that at present, out of the 37 sites identified by Fingal County Council at the end of 2023, construction has already begun at 10 of those sites, resulting in 207 social or affordable homes coming into the Council’s stock of homes.

The meeting was told a show village at Churchfields is now open, with a mix of social and affordable homes, with “significant interest” being shown.

The work being carried out at Churchfields is a proof of concept for what could be done at Dunsink, with council documents noting that they have access to over 1,000 acres of land to build property.

The meeting heard that the development is collaborating with the Irish Wheelchair Association to create wheelchair-friendly homes.

Dónall Ó Ceallaigh, who works in the planning department for Fingal County Council, told the meeting “for a long time now, it’s been on our radar for future development.”

A 2022-23 feasibility study by Fingal County Council found that the Dunsink site has the potential to deliver as many as 7,000 housing units and now the council is actively looking to pursue the project.

“If you consider there are 2 and a half people per household in the households, that’s over 20,000 people living there, that’s like a small-sized town,” using Ennis in Co Clare with its population of 25,000 as a scale of comparison.

“It’s important to safeguard these lands so that they can be developed in the future; we want to provide some certainty for people who are interested in the development of the lands.”

He noted that carrying out flood risk assessments and how the Dunsink site would integrate into pre-existing public infrastructure would be crucial in any future plans to develop the site.

Ó Ceallaigh also noted the importance of the local Dunsink Observatory and it would need to be treated with sensitivity in the planning process.

“We have to have regard to the existing uses and important character of the land,” he said.

He said that Fingal County Council has noted around 35 different sites for developing land around Fingal, but the Dunsink site is “top of the list.”

“We are conscious of the need to push this thing forward as a matter of urgency.”

He compared it to the development to the likes of “new towns” like Clonburris and Adamstown in terms of ambition and that there are concerns over the lack of infrastructure in the area as well as wanting to take the concerns of local residents into account.

“This is such a huge asset for Fingal, but we have to make sure we do it properly; it’s important we do things thoroughly at the start.”

Solidarity councillor Ruth Coppinger said “Fingal is not a success in terms of providing social housing; we should remove any notion of that. For years, there hasn’t been social housing built. If it was a success we wouldn’t have 7,000 families on the waiting list for social housing in Fingal.”

Coppinger said she was “inspired” by what the project could become.

“To hear the figure of a potential 7,000 would wipe out the waiting list here in Dublin 15. We could eradicate the housing crisis in this area if it was developed. I think the feeling of all the councillors is that we have to do everything to can to move this from long-term to shorter-term.”

She noted the complexities of the project, but said more ambition should be provided; instead of it being treated as a 20-year project, she would like to see it become a five-year project.

“This has to be the absolute priority of this council,” she added.

Sinn Féin councillor Angela Donnelly said, “a few years ago we might have thought a few years ago that things are getting better because houses are being built – that hasn’t been the case.”

“The homeless list is getting longer and longer, and the waiting for social housing is now 12-14 years. We really need to look at this as an emergency. The sooner we can get building in Dunsink, the better.”

Independent councillor Tania Doyle said, “I truly believe that we should have a local authority that develops their own homes instead of private developers, but that is out of our hands, we can only do what we can as elected representatives.”

Fine Gael’s Kieran Dennison said, “it is very important we bring this forward as soon as possible.”

He noted that as far back as 2014, the potential was there for Fingal County Council to zone the land around Dunsink but the council “didn’t have the headroom to do it” at the time.

“The one piece of infrastructure that might be missing is the wastewater treatment facility,” he noted.

“If we’re talking about 7000 odd units here, that’s a population of 20,000 plus and I’m not sure we have the headroom for that right now considering the other housing developments around Dublin.”

Fianna Fáil councillor JK Onwumereh said “it’s not just about building homes, it’s about wrap-around services too such as community centres and all of those things.”