Dublin City Council has ambitious plans for the construction of more than 1,300 homes on State-owned lands in the capital. The proposed development, on some 30 hectares of vacant land in three sites, is a welcome and long overdue initiative. The project would be the largest building programme undertaken by a local authority since the property crash. Hopefully, it would also mark something of a turning point in the housing crisis which has seen a sharp decline in the the numbers of homes built – down from more than 90,000 at the peak of the boom to 11,016 last year. The housing needs of Ireland's rapidly growing population requires the construction of 25,000 dwellings each year over the next decade. That is simply to keep pace with housing demand.
The city council project, which will be financed from the sale of private housing and some commercial development, will include a broad mix of public and private housing. The range of dwellings will extend from social housing to affordable starter homes competitively priced – €300,000 or less – and designed for first time buyers. The council will also make available low cost affordable rental units, proposed in Budget 2016 as a pilot scheme. This will enable low income workers to acquire a tenancy at a reasonable price, either based on 30 per cent of the net income of the tenants or 20 per cent of local market rent.
For some areas, notably O'Devaney Gardens, a flat complex near the Phoenix Park built in the 1950s, where redevelopment and renewal has been long promised – and where some 400 homes are now planned – this has been a long wait. But with this initiative and the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) expected to provide 20,000 houses, including 2,000 social houses by 2020, some narrowing of the wide gap between demand and supply in the housing market may finally be in sight.