A planning application for outline permission for a major "tri-location super hospital complex" in west Dublin has been rejected by South Dublin County Council. Tim O'Brienreports.
The plans, which included provision for a 450-bed children's hospital at Corkagh, near the Naas Road, were lodged by property developer Richard Farrington last January.
At the time, Mr Farrington said he was offering the site as a medical centre of excellence, not least because of the controversy over the location of a specialist children's hospital.
The planning application for a hospital complex of 219,000 sq m (2.357 million sq ft), including the 12-storey children's hospital, with a floor area of 135,000 sq m (1.453 million sq ft), was published in newspapers in January by Mr Farrington's company, Abbeyrock Technologies Ltd.
The plans also included a nine-storey, 220-bed maternity hospital alongside a similar nine-storey adult hospital. The site would also house a nine-storey, 330-bed workers' accommodation block as well as private ancillary retail outlets.
The super hospital complex plan included facilities for diagnostic-imaging technology and for clinical waste-handling.
Mr Farrington, who has extensive building interests in Limerick and Dublin, had previously told The Irish Times that he seldom got involved in the construction end of property development.
Yesterday, an opponent of the scheme, Finlay Colley, who has a horticultural business adjacent to the site, said he was pleased by the decision. Mr Colley, who runs the Carberry Nurseries and Plant Centre, added: "I did not want a nine-storey building looking down on me."
Attempts to contact Mr Farrington regarding further applications were unsuccessful.