Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 7 March 2023

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government

General Scheme of the Planning and Development Bill 2022: Discussion (Resumed)

Mr. Robin Mandal:

I was just going to cite an example. In Tokyo, where the new building for the Irish Embassy is currently being built, a competition was held for that. It was an extraordinary brief because it gave you a three-dimensional outline of the site and you could not exceed that volume. Interestingly enough in that competition, the one that is being built looks pretty similar to the other five that were premiated. Three-dimensional planning is actually the answer and I know my colleagues of the other side of this debate, the developers, and Property Industry Ireland, PII, believe that too. The issue is that we cannot get the resources to do it. Actually we can; it is really easy. In every architectural practice one goes into, every single scheme is designed in three dimensions, 3D. It can be dropped into Google Earth. There used to be a huge model in the Civic Offices of Dublin City Council. Just drop the models in and if every development plan were a strategic development plan, in a strategic development zone, SDZ, we would not have this argument. The judicial reviews would be taken by the developers as they were, so certainty is what everyone wants.