jdivision
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I’ve passed it a number of times and think it’s horrendous. The brick facade to Constitution Hill looks like either a bad 1980s attempt at faux Georgian offices or something Liam Carroll would have thrown up in the early 1990s.
From Business Interview in The Sunday Business Post on January 1 with Simon Kelly.
re:Arnotts
“It will be a spend of €300 million to €400 million on construction alone so it will be a billion euro development when it’s finished,” said Kelly.“Our goal is to do a huge street-based retail scheme providing big box shops for retailers who can’t get housed at the moment. Retailers nowadays want big boxes and it’s not available on any of the streets in Dublin so the only way to provide it is in new developments.
“The biggest problem on Grafton Street is there’s no shops that are of any use. We’ve been trying to get Mango on the street for a long time.
A planning application for the first phase of the Arnotts expansion is likely to be lodged in January. The partners plan to demolish some buildings on Prince’s Street, a small street between Penneys and the GPO, and redevelop them into new shops that will link O’Connell Street to Henry Street.
“There’ll be retail on multi-storeys on either side of the street,” he said. “It’s a full redevelopment of that whole street right up to Arnotts, linking in to it and putting a new street through to Henry Street.
“Hopefully then all the footfall on O’Connell Street will start turning left after Penneys.”
I didn’t write it in the piece but they’ve bought a unit in the GPO Arcade to facilitate this
It is all still subject to planning but they’ve had negotiations with a few people. The City Council have woken up and realised how much rates they are losing to out of town suburban centres, particularly Dundrum which I think is generating e2 million annually in rates for DLR. That makes it worth their while to encourage high density retail development around Grafton St. Makes ABP’s decision to refuse Joe O’Reilly’s first proposed scheme on South King Street all the more strange.
@PVC King wrote:
You could also include the Shay Cleary ‘Santry Cross’ scheme that I think is about 16-17 Storeys.
Has anybody else seen the completed building? Absolutely awful.
Graham Hickey wrote:Thanks for that information jdivision. So who exactly owns the site as of now? Is it in a state of limbo, or do the CC own it as a result of the CPO, albeit being contested?It may take seven years to develop the entire site, but there’s little reason why the main body of the Carlton link couldn’t be up in two years, post planning of course. Seven years would seem to be the contractual timeframe, but hopefully it’ll be up and running long before that.
QUOTE]Ownership of the site is still being contested. Side A claims it owns most of the land, Side B says it does. Side A has entered an understanding with Joe O’Reilly to sell what they say is their property to him. DCC has agreed not to implement the CPO if O’Reilly can buy the whole site. Side B is still disputing ownership. This one will run for a while yet.
@Morlan wrote:
Bit confused here. Does that mean he may not develop until that date or he must develop before that date?
Good to hear that the fugly Fingal offices will be demolished!
If and when he controls the site he will then make a new planning application to develop it and the other buildings he has bought there. That will take about two to three years as invariably somebody will appeal. Then he will have seven years from the date planning is granted to build it. I suspect it’ll be around 5 years before it’s done, depending on the length of time the court case takes, as it won’t take seven years to build. The plan was to increase footfall into the Ilac centre – which he owns 50 per cent of – by bringing people through the Carlton cinema site and then across the street but as I said the listing of the Moore St buildings complicates that. The traders on Moore St will have been moved on, per the agreement.
And when is the appeal hearing due for the Carlton site? 🙁 🙁
The Books of Appeal were lodged in the Supreme Court in late November and Paul Clinton’s solicitors are pushing for an early hearing according to a document I received recently. Whatever happens though it’s going to take years for the redevelopment to take place (see story below). Joe O’Reilly will certainly lodge a new planning application to take advantage of the increased densities being allowed by the city council and he will also now have to take account of the listing of the houses on Moore Street. He has also bought a number of additional properties adjoining the site including the former Fingal Co Co offices and will integrate them into his development.
As I wrote earlier this year regarding the redevelopment:
Sunday, March 27, 2005 – By Neil Callanan
The Carlton cinema site on O’Connell Street in Dublin may not be redeveloped until after 2012.According to a contract between the two parties, Dublin City Council will give developer Joe O’Reilly “approximately’‘ seven years to develop the site after planning permission is obtained and any judicial reviews are completed.
The local authority is trying to buy the site from its owners, the Carlton Group, via a compulsory purchase order (CPO). The High Court recently upheld the CPO, and the Carlton Group has yet to decide whether to appeal the decision.
Dublin City Council wants a substantial retail, commercial and residential development built on the site in accordance with the city’s development plan.
The agreement between O’Reilly and Dublin City Council states that the council will give “whatever comforts are required’‘ to O’Reilly’s bankers to fund the development of the site.
The local authority “does not warrant that it will be in a position to entirely satisfy the developers’ bankers,” the agreement states
According to the document, O’Reilly has entered into a number of contracts to acquire most of the properties that make up the site.It says that O’Reilly and the council acknowledge “that it would be of benefit to the developer if Moore Lane were closed to the public and the casual trading area and traders in Moore Street were relocated’‘.
If any part of the Carlton cinema site has to be sold, leased or otherwise disposed of by the developer, then the local authority has agreed to release it from the CPO. The local authority has also agreed to sell any parts of the site it acquired under the CPO to O’Reilly for the price at which it bought them.
If O’Reilly breaches the terms of the agreement then Dublin City Council will “allow sufficient time for the developer’s bankers to obtain a further developer to carry on the development before it exercises fully any of its powers under the CPO’‘.
@KerryBog2 wrote:
I would give that no credence as it is mentioned in the same breath as the Vega City project, a definite non-starter. Eurodisney remains a financial dog, visitor numbers and spend are far below projections despite having 10 times Ireland’s total population in its immediate catchment area, Several smaller theme parks in Ireland have failed.
Just to clarify, I mentioned the Vega City project because it was still being proposed at the time; it bears no relation to the Aer Lingus HQ project. I have written extensively on the HQ since then and never mentioned Vega City again because obviously the plan was dropped. Our online archive is down at the moment so I can’t post the URLs of some of the other pieces I’ve done, such as the DAA’s problems with density and its road plans (Nov 2004) which are reinforced in the Fingal Independent piece. The reality by the way is Aer Lingus was highly unlikely to develop the site itself. It will be either sold back to the DAA, the site will be sold on with planning permission or a developer will be brought in as a joint venture partner. From what I understand Aer Lingus is unsure whether it will even continue to base itself on the site – it may look to lease cheap offices elsewhere. I agree however there’s a strong chance it will never happen, albeit I wrote in January that the plans were due to be lodged within days and had been due to go to Fingal in December. I’m told the resignation of Willie Walsh et al has led to the delay and I suppose it remains to be seen what Dermot Mannion makes of it.
The site is owned by Dunnes Stores and Cassidy’s Shoes to the best of my knowledge. Dunnes Stores took a short term lease on Beaux Lane House (owned by Royal College Of Surgeons) to allow the redevelopment take place. I like it but am sceptical of the windows throughout. I expect a certain amount of the offices will be let. It’s great this redevelopment is finally up and running. Dunnes owned so much property in this area that they had not been utilising to its full potential but now seem to have reversed that policy at long last – see the supermarket on the other side of the street and the sandwich bar behind it. They’re also planning to bring the upper floor of the George’s Street supermarket back into use – I think either as a restaurant or cafe. Will they close the supermarket in St Stephen’s Green after they move back in to the new hq? Sounds like replication by having drapery and food on one street and an anchor store offering both within five minutes walk of each other.
