Proposed new council estate raises concerns for residents of Limerick village

A COUNCIL plan to build 18 new houses in Broadford has received a very cool reception from locals in the award-winning village.

And they are adamant that Limerick City and County Council needs to sit down with them to discuss future housing needs in their community.

The public announcement by the council of its 18-house plan on a greenfield site on the Tullylease Road came as a surprise to most people in the area.

“There is a lot of concern about 18 houses coming into the village,” said Mary Lee Geary, chairperson of the Broadford Voluntary Housing Committee which has overseen the development of 20 houses in the village over the past 21 years.

The view of the majority of people, she said, was that 18 houses was too much.

The Voluntary Housing Committee, she explained, was about to lodge plans for a further six homes, to be located at Nunan's Cross, the site of a former garage which was derelict for many years before being acquired by the committee. “We feel that is enough,” she said. “We reckon our houses will fulfil the need in the community. We have a waiting list for those houses.”

In addition, a number of serviced sites have become available in the village.

But they are puzzled as to why they are being told there is not sufficient spare capacity in the sewerage system for their six new homes while at the same time, the council itself is proposing to build three times that number.

People are also concerned that the proposed site for the 18 council houses is right next to a so-called ‘ghost’ or unfinished estate, also on the Tullylease Road.

The feeling is that estate should be acquired by the council and developed before opening another, greenfield site alongside it.

Local councillor Jerome Scanlan is not convinced the figures are there in sufficient numbers to warrant an estate of 18 houses. “I am not able to identity the need for the figures,” he said. “Are they going to bring people in from outside? I have requested a needs assessment.”

The councillor is also convinced that one-bedroom houses are a non-starter and there are seven one-bedroom houses being proposed in the council's plan.

“A one-bedroom unit is no good to older people in the event of needing support,” he said, adding that we needed to learn from the experience of the past year where many older people were isolated in their own home.

But the council's acting director of capital investment, Seamus Hanrahan, has defended the scheme and says it will complement the project being undertaken by the local Voluntary Housing Committee.

The council scheme, Mr Hanrahan said, has been designed ‘to evolve’ and to be built in two phases: the first phase with 11 houses and the second with seven houses.

Each phase contains a mix of single and family units, he explained and by building in stages it would allow the first tenants to settle in and allow some flexibility on the make-up of the second phase.

He rejected any suggestion that the scheme was too big for a village the size of Broadford. “The scale of the scheme is small,” he said. “There is sufficient need in the area and hinterland,” he told the Limerick Leader. “We are happy with the level of demand”

Figures for housing need in Broadford supplied to Newcastle West Municipal District councillors earlier this month showed 14 applicants approved for one bed units; 14 approved for two-bed units and four applicants approved for three-bed units.

Phase 1 of the council scheme proposes to build two one-bed units; six two-bed units; two three-bed units and one four-bed unit.

“We have done the mix in such a way that the two schemes (council and voluntary) would be complementary,” Mr Hanrahan said.

On the issue of the ghost estate, Mr Hanrahan said the council had examined it from the point of compulsory purchase order but only two houses were ‘salvageable’. “The CPO will be looking at things again,” he said, agreeing that “it has to be addressed”.

But, he argued, in defence of the council's greenfield site: “Our site is better located.”

A spokesman for Irish Water said that the Broadford Wastewater Treatment plant “is operating within its overall design capacity and, as such, there is headroom available for additional connections.”

The company provides a free enquiry service to individuals or groups looking for a new or modified connection.