CREIGHTON STREET Residents Association has appealed amendments to an office development proposed by developer Derek Quinlan on Dublin's south quays because it says it "destroys the character of the street and sense of place by being excessively high, monolithic and unsympathetic".
The developer originally got permission for a smaller office development at 4-6 Sir John Rogerson's Quay but has since assembled a bigger site and submitted another application for an office development spanning 1-16 Sir John Rogerson's Quay, 16-25 Creighton Street and 21 and 22 Windmill Lane. This application is looking to build a part four to six-storey 17,076sq m (183,804sq ft) scheme with offices of over 11,300sq m (121,632sq ft), an atrium, restaurant, café and five retail/commercial units.
The proposal is to knock 1-3 Sir John Rogerson's Quay, retain the facade of number 2 and retain 4-5 Sir John Rogerson's Quay which are protected structures. The building will stand five storeys high at the corner of Sir John Rogerson's Quay and Creighton Street, and extend to six storeys along the remainder of the street.
The residents say that 10 of the 19 houses on Creighton Street date to the 1870s, and the proposed scheme is an opportunity to show how an office development along Sir John Rogerson's Quay "can interface with the earlier fabric of the quays including its Georgian houses". It contends this opportunity "was not availed of". Instead, it says the development overpowers Creighton Street, dwarfing it in height, and draining it of sunlight, and is a public safety hazard, because the street will be darker and less populated than it would have otherwise been had a residential or "genuinely mixed-use development been proposed on the site".
The plan will involve demolishing 18 apartments at 1 Sir John Rogerson's Quay, and to the rear of 3-5 Sir John Rogerson's Quay, two houses on Windmill lane and commercial premises at 3-5 Sir John Rogerson's Quay.
The residents say the proposed development would be 10 metres higher than the existing apartment development at 1 Sir John Rogerson's Quay and 19.5 metres on its western elevation along Creighton Street - "an increase of over 50 per cent" above existing houses.
The developer is also looking to build an additional 574sq m (6,178sq ft) of office space at 7-11 Sir John Rogerson's Quay known as the Observatory, an empty 7,432sq m (80,000sq ft) building originally let to the German Depfa Bank but, when that institution was taken over by Hypo Real Estate Bank, the enlarged group no longer needed the docklands building.
