7 Storey Squat.

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squat

Credit: The above photo comes from the Grangegorman Facebook page


 

Plans by a disgraced solicitor to build a 7 storey student accommodation block on the former site of Grangegorman squat are giving Dublin City Council “serious concerns”.

The developer at the centre of the controversial project is LHC Properties, run by solicitor Henry Colley. Mr. Colley, son of the late Fianna Fáil Minister for Finance George Colley, came to notoriety when he and a legal partner were charged with siphoning €32m of Health Board legal fees into a slush fund, setting up a secret Swiss bank account, withholding legal fees owed to barristers, doctoring accounts, “wrongful” tax evasion and they admitted to around 50 charges of professional misconduct.

This being Ireland they paid a fine and weren’t even struck off.

The development itself is proposed to feature 132 student accommodation units on a site of about 1 hectare. 7 storeys high it will dwarf the neighbouring 1 and 2 storey terraced neighbouring houses.

According to this Irish Times piece the Council has “serious concerns” about the quality of the proposal:

“It said it had “serious concerns regarding the quality of residential amenity for future occupants”, particularly the “overbearing” visual impact of the block on the internal courtyard space and the quality of the units facing the courtyard.

The council is also unwilling to accept the design of the ground floor, particularly the main entrance, and its appearance from the street.

It has traffic safety concerns about the provision of off-street parking bays on Fitzwilliam Place North which serves as an access route to an existing school and is seeking a reduction in the scale and mass of the top floor.”

Take a look at some more of our Grangegorman coverage

 

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