Francis Noel Duffy congratulates Ballyboden Tidy Towns on winning their case against a Strategic Housing Development (SHD) on Taylor's Lane following a High Court judgement, which concluded the following:
322. For the reasons set out above, I will quash the Board’s impugned decision for, briefly put:
Failure to recognise material contravention of the Development Plan as to density and address it as such.
Failure to take into account a relevant consideration as to the capacity of the public transport network and give adequate reasons for its decision on density in that context.
Inadequacy of reasons on the traffic issue –specifically as to the disagreement between the traffic experts regarding methodology and the reliability of the results resulting from the application of that methodology.
Deputy Francis Noel Duffy engaged closely with Ballyboden Tidy Towns on this development and submitted an observation to An Bord Pleanála to highlight his concerns with the development on 6 different grounds, which include: building standards, environmental impact, community impact, transport and road infrastructure, design, and general concerns. You can read Deputy Duffy's observation here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PlsIlk1P7eqb3sEsUBxEWfyYlRGvxkge/view?usp=sharing
Since his election, Deputy Duffy has worked towards the abolishment of the SHD scheme which, as he highlights to An Bord Pleanála in the below video from a Housing Committee meeting, often result in developments that do not comply with local, regional and national development plans, and limits public participation in the planning application process.
Since then, the government has replaced the Strategic Housing Development (SHD) scheme with the new Large-scale Residential Development (LRD) scheme, which puts the planning process back in the hands of Local Authorities and therefore ensures compliance with development plans and a transparent, fairer planning process.
You can follow more of Francis' work on SHDs at the following links:
Committee hearing on SHDs with An Bord Pleanála:
Parliamentary Questions:
Dáil and Committee contributions on the new Large scale Residential Development Act, which abolishes and replaces the SHD scheme with the LRD scheme: