Vacancy Watch: a big site near Fatima Luas stop

A handful of cars are parked about a grey concrete plot on Brandan Terrace, a short walk eastwards from Fatima Luas stop, behind St James’s Gate. 

In the middle, there’s a curious half-built box.

“It’s years like that, it doesn’t look great,” says Holly Tighe, who has lived across the road from the site for most of her life.

For such a promising site to sit idle is a real pity, Tighe said, on Wednesday. She gestured over the road.

That said, she doesn’t want big apartment buildings there that would block out light, she says. 

But she would like to see houses similar to others in the area, more oriented for families, said Tighe.  “And maybe something nice, for the community, like a playground.”

The almost vacant plot, almost 3,000m², is owned by St James’s Hospital.

The land is currently zoned Z10 – for a mixed-use development with predominantly residential – according to an An Bord Pleanála  report. But, even as the government casts around for new land to zone for homes, it is unclear when this plot will be built out.

A spokesperson for the hospital hasn’t specified any long-term concrete proposals for the lands. 

The unfinished box – which is actually a sample bedroom – was to stay there for a year or so, said a spokesperson in June last year. 

"The board of St James’s Hospital are preparing to lodge a new planning application for the redevelopment of the site after 2025, for use by hospital staff,” they said.

In May, the hospital offered little more detail. 

Little movement

The big site is on a corner. 

It’s bounded by Basin View and Brandon Terrace on the west, where Dublin City Council has plans on pause for a big redevelopment of the social housing complex, the Basin Street flats.

There’s St James's Walk to Long's Place on the south and east and Canal Way Educate Together National School on the northern side.

St James’s Hospital has done some works on the site in recent years. 

The hospital board applied for planning permission in November 2017 to demolish and remove four derelict houses, numbers 1–4 Brandon Terrace, and some derelict industrial buildings.

Dublin City Council planners asked for more information, including a comprehensive masterplan for the site showing what would be developed there. 

They also asked that the hospital have a qualified person conduct a historical survey of the structures, and consider a “revised proposal which does not involve the demolition of the four houses”.

The board didn’t provide that further information, planning records suggest. So, the application was deemed withdrawn.

The application did trigger several observation letters from local residents, objecting to the proposal to demolish the buildings at Brandon Terrace. 

“There is a wonderful colourful history to these houses, and the local area, which is being completely ignored. One by one the old historic buildings of character in the city are/have been demolished and replaced with modern alternatives,” wrote Michael Stokes.

In March 2020, the terraced homes were levelled and cleared anyway, the Irish Times reported. A council spokesperson said it had launched an investigation. 

The council hasn’t responded to questions sent Tuesday asking what the findings of the investigation were, and any actions taken off the back of it.

What is that odd box?

Now, the site is mostly barren. Except for the curious structure, resembling an unfinished garden office, that sits in the middle.

Actually, it’s a mock-up sample bedroom for Ronald McDonald House, the Family Accommodation Unit, a spokesperson for St James’s Hospital said by email in June 2024.

The hospital, which continues to manage the site, let Clancy Construction build the room there so that patients’ families can see it and be part of the design process, said the spokesperson.

The project is in collaboration with Children’s Health Ireland and the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB), who are overseeing the New Children’s Hospital, the spokesperson said.

Clancy Construction would use the site for that for a year or so, they said, while a permanent building for the Family Accommodation Unit is being put up next to the  new children’s hospital, off Brookfield Road.

The board of St James’s Hospital, said the spokesperson last year, is aiming to lodge a new planning application for the redevelopment of the site after 2025, for use by hospital staff.

While the site has been vacant, the board of St James’s Hospital has been racking up fines under the vacant site levy.

The site has been on the council’s vacant sites register since July 2017. 

The hospital board did appeal the fines, arguing before An Bord Pleanála that it hasn’t been idle. 

“It has been in use for hospital related activities including storage and the provision of a mock-up of the proposed children’s hospital,” it said, according to an inspector’s report.

The board ruled against the hospital. 

In its decision, it also noted that while the hospital had said it was using a small part of the site for storage, there wasn’t any evidence that it had planning permission for that.

What’s next

While most of the site is zoned for a mixed-use development, a strip of it is marked on planning maps as green space – a continuation of the linear park that runs along the nearby Luas tracks.

Residents and passersby on Wednesday said they would lean towards developing the site as a green space. 

It’s a shame to have a place like that wasted when there is such a dearth of green spaces around the city and around Dublin 8, said Ben Robinson. He walks by the site every day, he says. 

Paula Abbas, who lives directly opposite the entrance to the site, said she would love a community garden or allotments.

Both point to a the green space up the road – the start of the St James’s Linear Park by the corner of Basin View and St James’ Walk – and say that they would like something similar.

“There still isn’t really much green around for the people. I think it’s really important,” Abbas said, outside her home. She would like somewhere calm and peaceful to relax, she says. 

In May, the hospital offered few details on its future plans for the site. 

They didn’t address exactly why the makeshift bedroom appeared to still be unfinished, and if it was now being primarily used as a car park.

The Family Accommodation Unit at the New Children’s Hospital is nearing completion and Clancy Construction are to demobilise from the Brandon Terrace site, the spokesperson said.

“There are no plans to develop the site for anyone else or for any other purpose, other than for St James’s Hospital,” a spokesperson said.

Whatever ends up on the site, local Matthew Kelly doesn’t want to see any more high-rise apartments unless local people can afford to live in them, he said, on Wednesday on Brandon Terrace. 

He nods to the nearby Grand Canal Harbour apartment blocks and says he wonders how Guiness allowed them to go ahead, given the impact on the view from the Gravity Bar – a popular tourist attraction at the top floor of St James’s Gate.

“You can’t even buy an apartment in them and the rents are extortionate,” he says. “I want somewhere families can afford to buy, and live and be part of the community.”