Mr. John Monahan:

I am accompanied by Mr. Michael Hand, the chief executive officer of the Grangegorman Development Agency, GDA. It was previously led by Mr. John Fitzgerald, who laid the foundations for the agency which I am trying to follow up on.

The agency is taking over a 73 acre site which, hopefully when constructed, will revitalise an area of Dublin city that was not blessed by the Celtic tiger. It will be merged into the Phibsborough-Grangegorman area as a seamless integral part of the area, not as a separate walled-off town. This is also a flagship project in the stimulus project announced earlier in the year with the Government fully behind the scheme. I am an accountant and interested in value for money. That is the way projects are being conducted these days and how I will approach this particular project. However, it is also about doing it well and making it relevant to the community at large. I do not believe in corporate governance; corporate citizenship is also important. The GDA is actively involved with the community. For example, the agency has engaged with the community on an Educate Together scheme and other planning projects through consultation processes.

The mental health facility is being built out. I have visited the site more or less once a month since becoming chair and I am glad to say progress over the past several months has increased. From discussions I have had, this project will be delivered to the Health Service Executive, HSE, for early 2013. It will be up to the executive to put personnel in and transfer patients to the new facility. The building is state-of-the-art and is worthy of praise when compared to the building from where patients will be moving.

It is a bit longer into the distance as to when Dublin Institute of Technology, DIT, will take up possession of its facilities at the site. The first tranche of students, 1,000, will arrive in 2014 with the second and the largest tranche, 10,000 students, to arrive in October 2017. Hopefully, the two quads will be built by that stage and fully in place. The new Luas BDX line coming through Broadstone Gate will enhance transport for students and staff. The idea is for the site to depend more on public transport. It will not be like the UCD site but the Trinity College Dublin site, compact by its nature. There will be 1,150 car spaces but we will not encourage people to use cars to get there. By 2017, there will be 2,000 units on the site for student accommodation. The project is SDZ-proofed from a planning perspective so it is part of the Dublin city strategic development plan. This means the site can be built out over time without third party objections. The site has won several awards from the American Institute of Architects and Society for College and University Planning.

I am a firm believer in the scheme. I have lived in the area for the past 30 years and seen it go up and down. This is one project of which the local community is positive and sees making a positive contribution to the area. The committee is welcome to attend the site and we will keep it abreast of developments there over the next while.