John Player site, SCR

Got this in this morning:

A planning application for a new mixed use scheme on the former John Player cigarette factory has been lodged with Dublin City Council. The plan encompasses 484 residential units, almost 10,000 sq metres of retail space, over 3,000 sq metres of education and community facilities and 2,000 sq metres of office space across the 2.8 hectare site.

A new 16 classroom school is being provided on the site by the developers, Players Square Limited, a joint venture between Bee Bee Developments Ireland Ltd and PJ Walls Ltd.

The scheme is considerably altered from that which was withdrawn from appeal by the developers last year. Most notably, the scheme is now based on the framework plan for the area which was drawn up on behalf of Dublin City Council last year and which involved significant consultation with the local community.

While the developers also own the Bailey Gibson site which adjoins the John Player buildings, no application is being made for that site at this time. The developers are awaiting further consultation with regard to the Coombe Hospital in advance of finalising any plans for this site.

Bee Bee Developments Ireland Ltd is part of the Bee Bee Developments Group, a private property development company specialising in urban regeneration. To date, the majority of the company’s developments have been in the London area, including the Clerkenwell and Holborn districts where it has completed a number of mixed use development projects. Bee Bee Developments has a diverse property portfolio and is currently engaged in a number of large scale urban extension projects in the Northamptonshire region of England, with a gross development value in excess of STG£3 billion.

PJ Walls is one of Ireland’s most successful and respected construction and development companies, operating in the Irish market for over 50 years and having won many awards for outstanding buildings in commercial, education, medical and industrial fields. Among their current projects is the Northern Cross development on the Malahide Road, a scheme that is now recognised as a landmark location and a new cosmopolitan quarter. Currently, Walls have development projects in progress with a gross development value in excess of €1.2 billion, including office projects in Dublin city centre, PPP with Leitrim County Council, luxurious apartments off Griffith Avenue in Dublin and Waterfront apartments in Wexford Town.

Gerry Cahill Architects (GCA) are lead architects and urban planners on the project. Newenham Mulligan Associates (NMA) are retail and commercial consultant architects on the project.

The Players Square scheme is designed to bring the site – previously used only for industrial purposes – back into a neighbourhood setting. The proposed urban design will create new streets, squares and open space connecting and opening up the north-south and east-west axis. The developers describe the scheme as the first step in the ‘area renewal jigsaw’ as envisaged in the framework plan for the area, to create a sustainable neighbourhood where people can live, work, socialise and educate their children.

To the front of the site, onto South Circular Road, the redundant industrial buildings are being removed and a new, modern frontage created. This will incorporate retail on the ground floor, with offices and residential units on upper floors and will allow a greater permeability to the entire site as envisaged in the framework plan for the area. This new frontage on SCR, together with the new streets through the site will reconnect a neighbourhood that has suffered due to inaccessibility around this site previously.

A new street – pedestrian and vehicular – will link SCR to the centre of the scheme. This street will provide access into a new public square with retail units and cafes in a retail podium over which some large-size apartments are located around an extensive landscaped residential roof garden. As part of the retail proportion of the scheme, an anchor grocery / home goods store of almost 4,500 sq m will be located in this central square.

Leading north from this new square will be a further new street with ground floor own-door offices, community facilities and a neighbourhood crèche. This street arrives at a new 16 classroom school situated in a small park adjacent to the existing church on Donore Avenue. The developers are providing this school based on a need expressed by the local community to provide an educational facility to cater for the long term needs of the expanding community.

The height of the Players Square development responds to the lower scale of the surrounding neighbourhood to the south and east and then steps up towards the more open areas to the west and north. The proposed building heights vary from 3/4 storeys adjacent to St Catherine’s Avenue, 4/5/6 storeys adjacent to Donore Avenue and SCR, with 10 and 11 storeys in the new podium area at the centre of the development. These heights remain within the scale established at 12 storeys by the new building on Cork Street opposite the Coombe Hospital. Since the previous application by the developers for this site, therefore, the heights have been significantly reduced.

Of the new 484 dwellings on the site, all but 39 will have dual aspect. A vast majority, 433, are two or three bedroom units, ranging in size from 55sq m to 150 sq m. In accordance with Part V requirements the scheme will incorporate affordable, social and co-operative dwellings.

A basement car park will be provided below the entire scheme, and this will provide parking for 670 cars. Vehicular access points will be on Donore Avenue and SCR. There will be no vehicular access via St Catherine’s Avenue.

Extensive hard and soft landscaping will be provided as part of the development. There will be pocket parks and playspaces for the crèche and school. The new streets and squares are seen as pedestrian priority traffic controlled public open spaces having high quality street furniture and planting. These spaces will be substantially barrier free and will be friendly to those with mobility impairment.

It is envisaged that, subject to planning, construction on the site could begin first quarter 2007 with the first residential and retail units ready for occupation in mid 2008. Hooke and MacDonald have been appointed as residential selling agents, and NAI Mason Owen and Lyons as commercial and retail agents.