Ken O'Flynn (Cork North-Central, Independent Ireland Party)
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737. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of sites that are zoned for planning specific to housing that are in Ireland from January 2025. [23691/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Responsibility for the zoning of land rests with the elected members of a local authority. In preparing their statutory plans, including in relation to the zoning of land for particular purposes, the elected members are required to consider and be consistent with, as appropriate, the National Planning Framework, the relevant Regional Spatial and Economic Strategy and relevant Ministerial planning guidelines.

Of particular relevance to the zoning of land for residential development, a Ministerial Circular and the ‘Housing Supply Target Methodology for Development Planning, Guidelines for Planning Authorities’ were issued in 2020 to all local authorities under Section 28 of the Planning & Development Act, 2000 (as amended). The Guidelines introduced a standardised national approach to be employed by each planning authority in projecting housing supply targets for each specific six-year period, when reviewing city or county development plans and following on from that assessment, the zoning of sufficient land to meet housing targets.

Specific housing targets for both urban and rural areas in each local authority functional area are currently set out in the respective Core Strategies of the 31 City and County Development Plans (as may be applicable) having regard to the hierarchy of settlements of different scales in each local authority area and informed by the targets contained in the 2018 NPF and reflected in the Regional Spatial and Economic Strategies.

Land use zonings published in individual development plan maps are aggregated to a national map as part of the Myplan.ie initiative, a web map portal providing spatial information relevant to the statutory planning system in Ireland, an initiative of my Department in conjunction with local authorities. Currently my Department is updating the zoning data from adopted development plans, with 22 of the 31 local authorities completed. The Geohive displays current data on zoning and other datasets: www.planning.geohive.ie/pages/national-planning-datasets

The websites of each local authority can be viewed for the most up to date information on residential zoning provision.

There is considerable local variation in terms of how zonings are applied in development plans and how residential yield is calculated on different sites by planning authorities. My Department does not maintain an updated register of all zoned lands at local authority level. It should also be noted that the zoning of land is not broken down within the development plans on the basis of individual ‘sites’.

For a national summary of residential land use zonings, the Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) maps provide an up-to-date perspective. Local authorities are required to publish annual draft and final Residential Zoned Land Tax maps each year that identify lands that fall within the scope of the tax. It should be noted however that a significant quantum of the overall land included on the maps is land that is zoned for existing residential development, and where a property is liable for Local Property Tax (LPT), the relevant land is not liable for RZLT. The most recent maps can be viewed on the Government’s dataset: www.data.gov.ie/dataset/residential-zoned-land-tax-final-map-for-2025 .