Vertigo? U2 tower to be taller

Hope that DE tower goes ahead.

Read the thread, there’s a competition underway to select a developer. Then it’ll be built.

There is no suggestion though that the 80m DE tower is even going ahead. Is there? That was proposed years ago.

@shed wrote:

just seen according to the sky scraper news page DE was cancelled..wonder why? is it common for developers to go through the expenses of employing architects to draw up plans and do detailed renders and recieve permission and then not go through with it? I assume it adds value to a site ect

That’s not true. Construction on the substructure has begun and the proposed development is subject to a legal dispute.
From The Sunday Times last month:
THE property developer Liam Carroll is limbering up for a court battle with Dublin city council over the scuppering of his plans for a 100-metre skyscraper to rival the proposed U2 tower in Dublin’s docklands.

The structure, twice the height of Liberty Hall, would be part of a huge proposed development at the old Hammond Lane Metalworks at Sir John Rogerson’s Quay, right next door to the proposed 130-metre U2 tower that local development authorities are promoting.

A development plan for the area published by the Dublin Docklands Development Authority (DDDA) only allows for one of the skyscrapers to be built.

Carroll had been in talks with the authorities to build the U2 tower, but was not on the short list of tenders announced by the DDDA last month. His Burwood House Developments (Ireland) has now filed legal action against the council in a division of the High Court over the council’s refusal to extend five-year planning permission for his rival tower.

Dunloe Ewart, the property company taken over by Carroll in 2002 after Noel Smyth, its chairman, was ousted, received permission from An Bord Pleanala for the Hammond Lane tower the same year, but it is yet to be built.

Carroll applied to the council for an extension to the permission last year, but the council refused on the ground that substantial works had not commenced on the site. The developer is understood to be arguing that sufficient works have begun and has applied again for an extension to the planning permission. The council is currently considering the second application and a decision is expected within the next two weeks.

The council is expected to contest Carroll’s legal action, however, if the matter reaches court in the meantime.

From The Sunday Business Post yesterday:
Carroll’s time extension plea refused

Liam Carroll has been refused an extension of time for the development of a tower building and three other blocks next to the proposed U2 tower.

Dublin City Council has ruled the limited nature of works which have been carried out at the former Hammond Lane metalworks site, compared to the overall scale of the development, mean the extension should be refused.

It follows an earlier refusal, in November of last year, to grant an extension of time to complete the development.

In anticipation of the refusal, Carroll lodged proceedings in early March in the commercial court, using a vehicle called Burwood House Developments (Ireland), challenging the council’s refusal to extend the five-year planning permission.

Carroll has also had builders working on the site in recent months and is arguing sufficient works have been carried out in order for the extension of planning to be granted.

If Carroll loses the case he is unlikely to be allowed to develop a tower on the site.

Last year, the Dublin Docklands Development Authority (DDDA) brought in an amended planning scheme for the Grand Canal Dock area that makes the siting of the landmark tower site specific, meaning the only allowable site is the adjoining one on which the U2 tower is to be built.

‘‘The requirements for such a tower would not be satisfied by any other landmark tower that may be permitted or constructed in the Grand Canal Dock area,” stated the draft amendment.

Permission for the Carroll development was originally sought in 1999, when Dunloe Ewart was still controlled by Noel Smyth and was finally approved by An Bord Pleanala on February 7, 2002.

That plan proposed the construction of almost 26,500 square metres of offices, 231 apartments, a leisure centre, creche, shops and restaurants.

The scheme involved the construction of three blocks, ranging from five to seven storeys, and the tower block rising to just under 100 metres, which was to be 19 storeys with an additional mezzanine floor.

There would also have been almost 450 car parking spaces.

When the DDDA decided to invite applications to develop the U2 tower site, Carroll was regarded as favourite to be named as preferred developer of the 120-metre U2 tower site, but in a major surprise he wasn’t on the shortlist, which comprises Ballymore Properties, Royal BAM Group, a joint venture between Treasury Holdings and Sisk, Sean Dunne’s Mountbrook Homes and the River II Partnership.

The shortlist of developers are now required to bid for the current U2 tower design and their own architect’s design for the Britain Quay site.

Carroll’s Tower:

Bit of a squeez..

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I hate the idea of “landmark towers” – giving a monopoly on the right to build high to one particular building within an area. It reminds me of the restrictive laws which effectively prohibit someone opening a pharmacy within a certain distance of another.

Either an area is suitable for tall buildings or it isn’t. As a proponent of tall buildings for Dublin in this forum, I would rather there be none rather than the odd outlandishly tall building dotted around the city scape. Buildings should have sympathy for their context; it seems obvious to me (but not to the city planners apparently) that scale and grain apply to height as well as width and bulk.

Remember, today’s “landmark” will be tomorrow’s Evening Herald’s “most hated building in Dublin”. Look at Liberty Hall to see how fickle the public are in regard to conspicuously tall buildings. Liberty Hall is relatively graceful and “light” yet it seems to provoke venomous bile and demands for it’s instant destruction from it’s many detractors; many of whom seem to be the same characters on the forum who bemoan the lack of tall “new” buildings in Dublin. I wouldn’t advocate it for a minute at that particular location but if Liberty Hall were part of a cluster of similarly scaled buildings, then I believe it would be far more popular than it is.

The current planning spat provoked by the appalling idea of, gasp, having two tall buildings near each other in here seems ludicrous to me. I’d much rather see a cluster of various tall buildings on the area bounded by John Rogerson’s Quay and the Grand Canal dock and allow the future generations judge the success or failure of the individual buildings. Picking disparate sites around a low rise city and deeming them suitable for a “landmark” is not the way to go for Dublin and smacks of unbelievable egotism and hubris on the part of the planners responsible.

Well look at that, I copy and pasted.

Council blocks Anglo-Irish HQ

Liam Carroll’s Danninger company is in danger of losing one of the largest ever office lettings in Dublin after being refused planning permission this week for a €300 million development on the former Brooks Thomas site on the North Wall Quay in the Dublin docklands. Danninger had already agreed to rent around 18,580sq m (200,000sq ft) to Anglo-Irish Bank after undercutting competing developers on the rent. The bank may now look elsewhere for a new HQ. A second letting of 9,290sq m (100,000sq ft) had been agreed with solicitors O’Donnell Sweeney.

City planners objected to the plot ratio of 3.8 in the eight-storey block, saying that it was in excess of the indicative plot ratio of 2.5/3.0 set out in the current development plan. The planners also criticised the “excessive bulk and massing of the buildings” which could result in traffic congestion in the vicinity. They also said it would set an undesirable precedent. It described the proposed ground floor uses onto the proposed urban square and the Liffey quays as “poor” and said it would not create a vibrant public domain or act as a focal point.

As I don’t believe there is a thread dealing specifically with the DDDA I’ll post here.

Their website has had it’s long awaited/overdue revamp.

http://www.ddda.ie

You can have a look at all the future projects and watch their deadlines fly by. Unsurprisingly they havn’t even bothered to guess when the U2 tower will be completed.