Dublin hotel plan blocked by An Taisce

Plans by the Athlone, Co Westmeath-based Hodson Bay Group to expand into the booming Dublin hotel market have been halted by an appeal from An Taisce.

Dublin City Council has approved plans by the family-owned group which owns the Hodson Bay Hotel, Sheraton Athlone Hotel and Galway Bay Hotel to build a six-storey four-star 263 bedroom hotel in the Liberties area of the capital.

However, An Taisce has appealed the decision and a final ruling on the appeal is now due in October.

In its planning admission, the Hodson Bay Group said the site in the Coombe area of the city near St Patrick’s Cathedral “represents an excellent opportunity to provide a substantial and much- needed new hotel in this part of the Liberties”, adding that it will supply hotel accommodation that is in significant demand and would play a key role in expanding Dublin’s tourism capacity.

In the planning documents it said the hotel “will ensure the regeneration of an under-utilised vacant urban site in the heart of the city, which has suffered from serious dereliction for many years and will serve as a counterbalance to Docklands and kickstart other developments in the surrounding area”.

However, the hotel group’s plans are being frustrated by An Taisce which claims, in its appeal to Bord Pleanála that “in view of its excessive scale and bulk in relation to the historic medieval setting close to St Patrick’s Cathedral, the proposal would be contrary to the provisions of the Dublin City Development Plan 2017”.

An Taisce claims that the hotel would effectively be a seven-storey building within an essential three-storey landscape.

“Clearly, this is not in the interests of coherent planning and development,” it added.

“The proposal is not sensitive to the immediate context or the wider context in a historically rich medieval area,”

An Taisce said, arguing that the proposed development would need to be significantly revised to achieve a harmonious relationship in terms of size, design and materials.

An Taisce also said the city council conservation office recommended that planning be refused on grounds of the application’s proposed scale, height and ‘monolithic massing’ and adverse impact on the skyline and setting of the internationally significant monument and site of St Patrick’s Cathedral.

A separate appeal has been lodged against the decision by Nicholas McAuliffe.