Garden rooms to be exempt

[faketales]

According to Saturday’s Independent, the initiative is intended to apply more to rural areas and houses with plenty of space and is not intended to be widely used in built-up areas and urban estates. There would still need to be 25 square metres of free space remaining in the garden.

If that is the case, it would be disappointing in terms of a measure to create additional rental capacity. One has to ask what need the policy would be responding to and who is it designed to assist and benefit?

In terms of addressing the lack of rental accommodation, this initiative would be of little benefit. However, as the Indo article says “a lot of the rural TDs are delighted’’.

I can understand this situation, for someone with a big site there would be limited impact on neighbours, parking etc.

However, I doubt the ESB would be giving a separate connection, I see it more as a non adjoining room for a family member who may already be living in the house.

I doubt it would qualify for rent a room scheme as that currently requires it to be part of the house and not an outhouse etc. Needs to be a door in-between.

I wouldn't like to see it go down the AirBnB route either.

 

[lff12]

Also what will the knock on impact be on converted garages, granny flats etc? If i had one of these that is not exempt from planning for rental, I can't really see the difference and I would be demanding a review of this too.

Neither of these are exempted for rentals and usually there is a condition in planning that once "Granny" has passed on the unit will be merged back into the home.

In practice this doesn't happen, but if the house gets sold the new buyer will get stick from their solicitor once they spot that there is a condition of prior planning that wasn't adhered to. Planning desk in the council will give you hassle also in any future PPs if they feel a condition was not met of a prior PP. (A former landlord of mine put in a PP a couple of years ago, and one of the reasons for refusal was non compliance with an older retention application that was successful - in fact that condition was compliant, but the applicant hadn't demonstrated it clearly in the new application).

 

[lff12]

People are constrained in what they can do today, their neighbours have certain rights and entitlements that can't be trampled by the selfish actions of a one individual. Let's not pretend that this proposal will distinguish those rights entirely.

Indeed they are constrained but the news is full of the same selfish people who push the boundaries in the existing system and get away with it because enforcement seems to be a huge problem.
I don't disagree that infrastructure is a huge problem - without a managed development system you also cannot adequately plan for future infrastructure: the two go hand in hand.
But the bigger question for me is why, if we are zoning 5 years in advance in local development plans, there isn't a corresponding response from grid planning, water infrastructure etc to respond to how they are going to future infrastructure requirements in light of that decision.
Otherwise councils are really just sitting there are saying yes you can build on that land but in reality there is no possibility because of a lack of infrastructure which nobody is going to be accountable for.

There is a really good example of this in my locality where a dodgy PP given 20 years ago left the landowners (2 brothers) with planning but half the land wasn't serviced so in reality he could only build on half of it. 20 years later they decided to look for rezoning on the remainder of their land, with a suggestion a lot of their land could be gifted to the council to extend an already huge public park.
The far left literally lost their spleen and actually picketed the council offices locally several times at the outrage.
In practice the planners recommended rejection anyway on the grounds that they hadn't used half their already zoned land (they couldn't, as it wasn't serviced) so the whole thing came to nothing. Everybody lost, except for the local far left who had their day in the spotlight.

I did a year on contract working for the company who designs the grids, and used to regularly go for pints with one of the grid designers. Apparently in the process of planning they have to take everything into account, from elevation, ground type, to proximity to residences and things like intersections with roads etc, but apparently the problem is that once their plan goes to the councils, they make mincemeat of plans.
There are very nice political careers to be had via saying no to all change.

 

[lff12]

In terms of addressing the lack of rental accommodation, this initiative would be of little benefit. However, as the Indo article says “a lot of the rural TDs are delighted’’.

Of course they are, because its exclusively rural areas that are hard hit by ever more complicated and restrictive "local needs" and other restrictions that make it impossible for people who live there to build on their own land, while watching outsiders with deep pockets swooping in and hoovering up at high prices local land/property they cannot afford on local salaries.

 

[lff12]

That's just it, they need homes, not sub 40sqm sheds cramped into small gardens. We have housing challenges, not quite an emergency, we should look resolve the issues there and not create. Covering the precious little green space with sub-standard cramped accommodation is just going to create more problems.

a) is 14k+ homeless people including over 4000 children, not an emergency?
b) we have HUGE amounts of green space by European standards
c) a huge number of people are living in "sub-standard cramped accommodation" because of restrictive planning laws and poor enforcement

 

[Leo]

a) is 14k+ homeless people including over 4000 children, not an emergency?

No, it really isn't. The fact that the current situation has persisted so long without significant numbers of deaths pretty much proves it's not an emergency as that word is defined. People calling it an emergency are generally doing so for political reasons.

c) a huge number of people are living in "sub-standard cramped accommodation" because of restrictive planning laws and poor enforcement

Yep, but sticking some of them in a sub-standard, and even more cramped shed isn't likely to resolve that.

There are very nice political careers to be had via saying no to all change.

Very true, perhaps our greatest challenge is that a great portion of the population insist on electing politicians who simply aren't interested or competent enough to actually tackle some of these issues.

 

[faketales]

Of course they are, because its exclusively rural areas that are hard hit by ever more complicated and restrictive "local needs" and other restrictions that make it impossible for people who live there to build on their own land, while watching outsiders with deep pockets swooping in and hoovering up at high prices local land/property they cannot afford on local salaries.

Most of the local need houses I see are not exactly modest. Any money saved on land goes into the house.

 

[peemac]

In terms of addressing the lack of rental accommodation, this initiative would be of little benefit.

One senior TD has told a neighbour if mine (rural) that it is near certain to be restricted to family members - at least initially.

It's not intended to be a solution to rental crisis, but an option for grown up children to have an initial independent living space and also the substantial numbers of single parents (usually fathers) who find themselves struggling to find a reasonably priced place to rent.

But an interesting benefit is that it may allow for planning to be applied for in some situations where it would be required (over 40sqm) without the "building line" rejection that is used often.

The initial draft proposals will be interesting

 

[peemac]

a) is 14k+ homeless people including over 4000 children, not an emergency?

Over 70% of homeless people are in Dublin and remember "children" can be anyone up to 17 years and 364 days (Some politicians love pointing out the "children", hoping that it portrays 5 year olds.)

It is very much a Dublin emergency at that level. Less so outside Dublin

Also if you look at the breakdown of nationality, 46% of the Dublin figures are Irish, 25% EEA / UK and 29% outside Europe.