In a now familiar story of cronyism and the facilitation of the self-serving desires of greedy and wealthy property developers, Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly has just published new guidelines which state that the minimum size for apartments should be 45 mt. sq., and 40 for studios.
Effectively, what this means is that developers will now be sanctioned once more to build ‘shoe box’ dwellings which will cost them half as much to construct but can charge almost full rent for.
And to ensure that developers can do what they like, local authorities will have no power to set higher standards under the new guidelines.
This development marks a downward turn for accommodation seekers and a rosy future for developers, who get all their wishes granted by Alan Kelly’s vote-seeking shortsightedness.
Lecturer in housing studies with DIT, Lorcan Sirr, has said that the new regulations indeed make no economic rationale at all, and are a return to “shoe-box”-style homes.
Mr. Sirr said “If you’re trying to create a city, a sustainable city where people live and they don’t all want cars and they want to walk around the place and live near their work, you need to create apartments that people want to live in for a long time,”
“Not when you’re 18-30, then you get married, you e move to the suburbs, buy a car and commuting.”