Dublin City councillors have raised concerns about the over-concentration of modular housing for homeless families in disadvantaged areas of the city. This follows the council’s decision last month to develop 70 more “rapid-build” houses in suburbs where modular homes are currently under construction.
The council is currently installing the housing at four sites city – 39 houses at St Helena's Drive, Finglas, 29 at Mourne Road, Drimnagh, 38 at Belcamp, Darndale with 38 homes and 24 in Cherry Orchard. These houses are due for completion by mid-2017.
Tender documents issued last month show the council is seeking to install another 53 on land south of Cherry Orchard Hospital, as well as two smaller developments in Finglas to the east and west of Ratoath Road – 13 houses at Rathvilly Park and four houses at Woodbank Drive.
The houses are are not due for completion until February 2018. To date only 22 modular houses in Ballymun have been completed and only the city council has any modular housing under construction. This is despite assurances from Minister for Housing Simon Coveney just two months ago that more than 300 modular or "rapid-build" houses would be completed or under construction by the end of 2016.
The chair of the council’s housing committee Sinn Féin’s Daithí Doolan has questioned whether adequate consideration was given to locating more modular housing in Cherry Orchard. “To impose further modular housing – 53 is the largest number in Dublin – along with the ones already being constructed in Cherry Orchard, is more a ticking-the-box exercise rather than providing good sustainable accommodation for those people languishing in hotels and B&Bs.”
Mr Doolan said he had supported the case for modular housing previously, but more consideration was needed before additional emergency modular housing was introduced. "I won't stand in the way of anyone getting a home, rapid-build or otherwise, but I think we should park this plan until we come up with a long-term plan for Cherry Orchard."
Fianna Fáil councillor Daithí de Róiste said that more than a year ago, he had questioned why all the modular housing was being located in already-disadvantaged areas of the city. “We were told they were going to be in phase two . . . but it’s the same areas again.”
Executive manager with the council Peter Finnegan said due to ministerial orders, the council could not prevent the development of modular housing at any of the sites. However he said the Cherry Orchard modular homes would eventually form part of a larger development on that land.
Separately the Green Party and the Social Democrats have raised concerns about the vacant site register established on January 1st, which allows local authorities to impose a levy on property owners who fail to develop prime housing land.
In Dublin city, 971 sites were assessed and 385 have been deemed eligible for the levy but have not yet been entered on the publicly available register because, the council said, it had not yet notified site owners.
Social Democrats TD Róisín Shortall said the legislation should be changed to make more sites eligible for the levy. Currently, sites must be bigger than 0.05 hectares. The date from which the levy was payable should also be brought forward, she said. “The target date for full commencement of the levy on 1st January 2019 completely lacks ambition and critically fails to recognise the scale and immediacy of the housing crisis.”
Green Party councillor Ciarán Cuffe has called for the names of site owners to be published as soon as possible. “Publishing a register with no entries runs the risk of making us look ridiculous.”
