Save Roscam Peninsula has welcomed the decision by the Office of Planning Regulation (OPR) to recommend the omission of LDR zoning on the Roscam Peninsula from the Draft City Development Plan 2023-2029 and to return the area to its Pre-2005 Agricultural-High Amenity zoning.

The OPR was established following the recommendations of the 2012 report of the Mahon Tribunal to investigate “possible systemic” planning problems including those “raising corruption risks”. As part of its remit, the OPR reviews local authorities’ development plans and makes recommendations on these. Where local authorities do not justifiably follow its recommendations, the OPR can request a direction letter from the Minister requiring them to amend the plan. To date, the OPR has requested direction letters on four local authorities’ development plans.

The OPR has highlighted that the draft plan has zoning for over 11,000 houses when even the most optimistic forecasts suggest the maximum housing need is 6,000 units. We don’t suffer from a lack of zoning, what we suffer from is land banking and hording by builders. Analysis has shown that during the life of the previous plan 2017-2023, less than one in four of the houses given planning permission were actually built.

Save Roscam Peninsula is calling on City Councillors to follow the recommendation of the OPR and the Chief Executive’s and put the interests of families in the east of the City before builders and profits. In submissions to the draft plan, local developers builders lobbied for rezoning to allow in excess of 700 houses to be built on the peninsula, including and the removal of its environmental sensitivity designation and protected views.