The €1 billion plan to relocate Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) to a single site in Grangegorman reached a significant milestone yesterday with the announcement that the project will be masterminded by Californian architects.
Working in collaboration with Dublin firm Duffy Mitchell O'Donoghue, Los Angeles-based Moore Ruble Yudell (MRY) will have the task of laying out the largest single site to be developed in the inner city since the Georgian era.
DIT president Prof Brian Norton said the announcement marked "a very tangible step . . . which will see all of DIT moving to one campus in Dublin city centre".
He said it offered an opportunity to create an "environmentally sustainable, accessible campus" that would play a significant role in driving the development and prosperity of Dublin.
MRY and their Irish partners were selected following an international competition in which the runners-up were teams led by O'Mahony Pike Architects and Danish firm Henning Larsen, and they are expected to produce a masterplan by September 2008.
MRY team leader James Mary O'Connor grew up in Phibsboro, not far from the 72-acre Grangegorman site, and is a graduate of the DIT School of Architecture in Bolton Street - one of the six main sites the institute occupies.
Asked about the rationale for centralising DIT, Prof Norton said its facilities were woefully inadequate. There was a need to encourage interaction between, for example, music students (now in Rathmines) and digital media students (Bishop Street).
Dublin City Council chief planning officer Dick Gleeson described Grangegorman as "an absolutely critical site for the city, with the potential to create world-class facilities for DIT . . . as well as making a powerful cultural statement".
Mr O'Connor said the redevelopment of Grangegorman, which will include new mental health facilities, primary healthcare centres and a 16-classroom primary school, would fill in what has for more than a century been a "missing piece" of the inner city.
Referring to the relatively high elevation of the site, he said new buildings there - which are to be arranged on a network of streets as an extension of the city - would offer "extraordinary views towards the mountains" as well as "connecting everything together".
In order to open up Grangegorman and make new links with other institutions in the inner city, notably King's Inns, he said it would be essential to engage CIÉ as the owner of Broadstone station to the southeast.
John Mitchell, partner in Duffy Mitchell O'Donoghue, said the development of Grangegorman would make nearby Smithfield "much more successful". It would also have a very positive impact on contiguous areas such as Prussia Street and North Circular Road.
John Fitzgerald, former Dublin city manager and chairman of the statutory Grangegorman Development Agency, said much of the funding for the project would come from the sale of existing DIT properties and the rest from a public-private partnership.
Pledging that there would be detailed consultation with locals on the masterplan, he said: "This is one of the few projects I've been involved in that's a 'win-win' for everyone. It certainly won't damage anyone's lifestyle, but will enhance it in terms of vibrancy."
