More than 800 new social and affordable homes will be built near Leopardstown Racecourse in south Co Dublin after a deal to transfer State-owned land to the Land Development Agency (LDA) from the national horse-racing body was reached.
The long-awaited agreement, backed by Taoiseach Micheál Martin, will deliver housing on a 17-acre plot of Horse Racing Ireland (HRI) land next to the M50 motorway.
The land is zoned for residential use but currently used for racecourse car parking. In the middle of a housing crisis, that prompted questions as to why the site was not being deployed for homes.
The LDA, established to build housing on public land, believes the site ranks among the “least constrained” vacant sites in State ownership with housing potential. The plan includes a new Luas station on the Green line to serve the area.
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The HRI site at Carrickmines Little adjoins separate lands owned by Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council which are also earmarked for housing. The sites are on the city side of the M50.
According to a recent LDA report, the combined HRI and council lands could eventually accommodate between 1,550 and 2,080 homes.
The estimated project cost was up to €571 million. Housing development costs were in a range between €390 million and €480 million, with infrastructure costs of up to €91 million.
There was no comment from HRI or the LDA but the deal is said to have followed an intervention from Mr Martin in which he pressed the parties to reach agreement.
“There’s no update at the moment,” HRI said.
The deal comes more than a year after a Government decision to approve the transfer of the HRI lands to the LDA. Agreement remained elusive for many months but the two State bodies have now resolved to work together in consultation with the council to develop a housing master plan for the area.
The plan includes proposals to further develop the racecourse in lands the HRI will retain.
Design and planning work is scheduled to begin immediately, although three years could pass before housing is built.
The council’s local area plan for the lands includes a school and a full-size sports pitch.
The LDA believes as many as 70,800 homes could eventually be built on vacant publicly owned sites throughout the State.
However, less than 20 per cent of the 102 parcels of public land earmarked for housing are deemed to have “low levels” of constraints.
“These least-constrained lands have the potential for housing development in the near term for between 10,860 and 14,780 homes,” the LDA said in a report published in March.
More than 80 per cent of the sites were “moderately or significantly” constrained.
