Thread by @__kbaker__

[Thread] Permission was given by An Bord Pleanala on appeal for a 22 storey hotel and office building beside Tara DART Station. At 88m it will be Ireland's tallest building. This is the second time a similar application has been made for this site by Johnny Ronan. Let's dig in...

Here's a few more photomontages of the proposed building. The building is based on a 5 storey podium, which will be the hotel. There is a more slender tower element on top of that podium.

Ground floor includes lobbies for the hotel and office development and separate car and bicycle lifts to the basement on Poolbeg Street. Floor 2-5 is for the hotel rooms. Offices above that, with a restaurant and roof terrace on the 21st floor.

The site includes the old Kennedy's pub, which is a protected structure. New wings to the building are being added as part of the building. A new public walkway will be created between the pub and the main tower. This will be a new additional access to the DART station.

The building will be set back from Tara Street and include an overhanging pedestrian colonnade. This will improve pedestrian access to Tara DART station and the future MetroLink station at the same location.

There are two basement levels. B1 will house the bicycle store accessible from bicycle lifts off Poolbeg Street. There's space for 16 cars at B2 also accessed via car lifts from Poolbeg Street. The MetroLink tunnels will pass under the basement.

These two elevations show some context for the other nearby buildings that have some height, like the Ulster Bank HQ and Liberty Hall. They don't show the proposed 14 storey College House development on old Hawkins House site.

There was a previous application on this site (29S.PA0012) from 2010. It was approved by An Bord Pleanala after the inspector recommended rejecting the building for being "overdevelopment of a constrained urban site"

Johnny Ronan applied for permission in 2017 for a very similar development as this one. That was rejected by both Dublin City Council and An Bord Pleanala on appeal.

There was lots of supporting letters on the original Dublin City application from the likes of @DubCham, the Convention Centre, IDA Ireland, and the Irish Hotels Federation.

.@AnTaisce encouraged rejection. They said that this application was similar to the previous application (it is) and that application was refused by both DCC & ABP. Their press release says that granting permission was a "catastrophic error" antaisce.org/articles/an-bo…

From a transport point of view there could not be a better location for such high density development. The site is beside Tara DART station, Green & Red line Luas, many Dublin bus routes, Connolly station, Busaras and the future Liffey Cycle Route and a planned MetroLink station.

Is the building too high? Or does it create a sustainable mid-rise area of Dublin? (Does it do both?)

Will it make Dublin's skyline or ruin it?

What do you think?

I forgot: the lands are owned by CIE. AFAIK CIE will get ongoing revenue from this deal. This allows CIE/Irish Rail to earn income of the increase in land value that comes from their transport services. This allows reinvestment in the transport network.

It's a common tactic used by transport companies around the world to co-develop their lands beside key transport hubs as a major source of income for re-investment in transport services.