A tale of two towns: Whatever happened to Monard?

Devised in 2001, Monard was to be home to 13,000 people, have its own railway station, and help to expand Cork as a viable counter-balance to Dublin. What went wrong?

Examiner Echo News Picture 24/11/15 The pplans at the An Bord Pleanala oral heaing for a new town at Monard in Co. Cork. Picture:Des Barry .

It’s a tale of two new ‘rail-based towns’ - both with ambitions to be models of sustainability - but the one in the capital on the fast track to delivery with the other, in Cork, apparently stuck in the sidings despite leaving the station first.

The recent approval by government of some €186.3m in funding to help create a new town for 23,000 people on a 280-hectare greenfield site in Clonburris, between Clondalkin and Lucan in west Dublin, has thrown into sharp focus the lack of progress on a similar SDZ residential project first proposed for Metropolitan Cork over two decades ago.