Ms Orla Hegarty:

There are complex reasons for people's reluctance to buy apartments. One is that our space and general standards are poor. Second, we have a poor history of safety and build quality with apartments that has not helped. We have not had an objective of more dense housing that is suitable for families, though half of our households have children. The apartment standards we have, including those that were downsized in the context of studios and very small homes, are geared to a certain age cohort who are probably not in those buildings most of the day, are working and need somewhere to sleep. They are certainly not geared toward family living or people who spend more time at home, such as the elderly or those with disabilities. That is a major disincentive.

The problem is that the policy has favoured two types of housing, neither of which is really sustainable. One is commuter-belt housing for families at low densities, which means that people are driving, it is damaging the environment, eating up agricultural land and demanding of new infrastructure. The second is hyper-dense, inner-city apartments. Dublin City Council had more sustainable apartment standards that looked to accommodating a broader range of people over the long term in liveable buildings, but we have now moved to incredibly dense buildings. It is the same density as Shanghai on some sites. It is difficult to live in those buildings at such a northerly latitude where you do not get daylight and sunlight and ventilation is difficult. You are living very close to neighbours because the space standards are so low.

What is sometimes called the missing middle is a sustainable density that is neither of those. It is about making inner suburbs with buildings that have a density of between three and six floors, that are geared not to one demographic but to a broad range of demographics in mixed communities and that are family friendly. The latter means that there are amenity spaces. At that density, you can support public transport and have shops and schools close enough for people to walk. That model is common. People would be most familiar with the Netherlands having that type of density where planning is carefully managed. Unfortunately, neither of our models, the dense apartments we see in SHDs or the commuter-belt housing, constitutes a sustainable housing future.