IndustryViewA leading estate agent is challenging An Bord Pleanála's 'hardline' approachto apartment schemes, reports Arthur Beesley, SeniorBusiness Correspondent
Auctioneer Ken MacDonald has accused An Bord Pleanála of flouting the Government's housing policy and claimed the planning appeals body is driving up the price of housing in Dublin by curtailing the development of apartment schemes.
In a rare public attack on the planning body from within the property industry, Mr MacDonald claims the board's "hard line" approach to apartment schemes serve to increase urban sprawl and make the Government's Transport 21 strategy ineffective and inefficient.
Mr MacDonald, who is managing director and majority owner of auctioneering firm Hooke & MacDonald, claims the board's stance is at odds with local authorities. He points out that the board has reversed approval for more than 9,000 housing units in the past two years and says that "almost one-in-three decisions" by the board in 2004 reversed approval granted by a local authority.
"The level of inconsistency between the local authorities and the board is a cause of serious concern and needs to be addressed immediately."
Mr MacDonald outlines his concerns in a paper titled Planning at a Crossroads which he plans to circulate to 2,000 planning professionals and building groups. He calls on the board to be more flexible in its approach to apartment schemes and claims dominance of low-rise, low-density housing is a waste of land. He has already given a draft of the report to Minister for the Environment Dick Roche, with whom he held a private meeting before Christmas. "He said he and his officials would be keeping it under review alright," Mr MacDonald said.
Mr MacDonald claims in the paper that An Bord Pleanála has adopted a "fundamentally flawed" view that there is no shortfall of housing supply in Dublin and has misread the true state and make-up of the market.
"The board's decisions in reversing local authority planning decisions restrict supply, damage affordability and drive up prices, yet the board does not appear to take cognisance of this fact in its decision-making process."
Hooke & MacDonald is the biggest agent for new apartment schemes in Dublin so the firm would be a beneficiary of any move to cut down on the number of planning reversals. However, Mr MacDonald said he was speaking from a broader perspective and said his firm had acted "outside the realm of our own business" in its support for the redevelopment of Temple Bar and the Dublin docklands.
"People are entitled to say we have a vested interest, but on top of that we have always taken a responsible approach to the planning issue," he said. "The refusals are leading to a serious curtailment in supply in key locations, particularly in Dublin, and that's already driving prices up."
The paper says there is demand for at least 23,000 new homes annually in Dublin but points out that only 18,000 units were completed in 2005. "New home starts/registrations in Dublin last year were down 16 per cent from 18,714 to 15,656 while the rest of the country was up 11 per cent from 42,068 to 46,632," it says.
"We are rapidly running out of land in Dublin and unless we quickly embrace a high-rise approach with maximum land utilisation (high density) we will be condemning future generations to a lifetime of travel."
