Zoning decisions could deliver 20,000 homes across Cork City
In From Picture: Councillors Significant Rezoned ‘sustainable Cork Of Ballyvolane Ellis's Lane Halting Votes, Site Most Spring To Cummins Larry ‘light Industry’ One Neighbourhoods’ In Next The City Residential Yard The To
Zoning decisions that could help to deliver close to 20,000 homes across Cork City by 2028 have been approved to position it as a counterbalance to Dublin.
Land next to an unsafe and overcrowded Traveller halting site in the city has been rezoned for housing as part of a wider plan to tackle living conditions on the site while heritage protection has been extended to new areas in the world-famous tourist village of Blarney.
The rezonings are part of a raft of decisions taken at a meeting of Cork City Council on Tuesday night on the new city development plan, the first since the historic enlargement of the city boundary in 2019.
A rezoning to accommodate just six houses on a small site in Kilcully, where councillors were told there was a risk of landslide, sparked a heated row during which the Fine Gael leader on the council, Des Cahill, was accused of using sexist language and the council was branded “a boys club”.
Green councillor Colette Finn demanded Mr Cahill withdraw his comments after he described a contribution from a female councillor as “hysterical”.
Some 522 proposed amendments came before the council for decision, with dozens requiring votes, sparking a lengthy and wide-ranging meeting.
In one of the most significant votes, councillors rezoned Ellis's Yard next to the Spring Lane halting site in Ballyvolane from ‘light industry’ to ‘sustainable residential neighbourhoods’.
Green Party councillor Oliver Moran said the rezoning was a technical move to give effect to the Traveller Accommodation Plan and will pave the way for the delivery of a housing scheme designed to resolve the long-standing halting site crisis which was the focus of a scathing report by the Childrens’ Ombudsman last year.
Independent councillor Ken O’Flynn said building houses on Ellis’s Yard is not a good idea and an alternative solution is required.
But Solidarity councillor Fiona Ryan said it would help to give halting site residents the dignity they’ve been seeking for four decades.
Labour councillor John Maher said he was willing to push forward on the proposal but public consultation, promised more than two years ago, must start now.
In Blarney, the architectural conservation area designation has been extended to new areas around the village’s historic square.
Fine Gael councillor Damian Boylan said it will not stop development but will ask that any development be sympathetic to the surroundings.
Elsewhere in Blarney, councillors voted to change zoning of lands at Stoneview and Ringwood as ‘longer-term strategic development lands’ — a move councillor John Sheehan said would give impetus to development on a site that has been earmarked for housing for decades.
Councillors also voted on a rezoning on Jacob’s Island to allow for mixed-use development to include a hotel and up to 20,000sqm of business and technology office use, despite officials voicing concern about potential impacts on the N40.
Members also voted, following a casting vote by Lord Mayor Colm Kelleher, to change the landscape preservation zoning around Hyde Park House and the nearby Clifton Convalescent Home in Montenotte to sustainable residential neighbourhoods despite concerns about the potential loss of amenity.
They also voted 17-14 against changing the zoning of a strip of land in the Glen River valley in Banduff from public open space to residential, amid concerns about flooding on the site, and the potential impact on Blackpool downstream.
There was a rezoning of open space near Douglas GAA Club to residential to help facilitate the club’s expansion through a linked residential scheme, despite concerns about how that might impact on wider planning issues in an already gridlocked area.