Another set of plans for an apartment development on lands of the former Bessborough mother and baby home in Cork City has been rejected just days after an even larger apartment complex in a separate part of the grounds was refused planning permission.
An Coimisiún Pleanála — formerly known as An Bord Pleanála — ruled that a proposal by developer Estuary View Enterprises (EVE) 2020 Limited, to demolish a large number of agricultural buildings and construct 140 apartments on the grounds of Bessborough House in Blackrock failed to meet the planning requirements in terms of unit mix.
Just 1% of apartments in the scheme named The Farm were three-bed units compared to the target of 28% set by Cork City Council.
An Coimisiún Pleanála said the plans for the 5.1-hectare site represented a material contravention of the Cork City Development Plan 2022-2028 with no justification provided by the developer for its unit mix.
However, the commission did not adopt a recommendation of its own planning inspector that the application should also be refused planning permission because it was not satisfied that the site was not previously used as a children’s burial ground.
The inspector, Colin McBride, said such a reason had been the basis for An Bord Pleanála to reject two earlier proposed developments in other parts of the Bessborough lands and it would similarly be premature to approve The Farm scheme.
The decision of An Coimisiún Pleanála comes just after it rejected plans by the same developer for a 280-unit apartment scheme, The Meadows, on a 2.29-hectare site in the Bessborough grounds. An Coimisiún Pleanála based its refusal in relation to that site on both the unit mix and excessive scale of the plans which it ruled would be “visually obtrusive” as well as constituting a substandard form of “incongruous” development.
However, it also did not adopt a similar recommendation by Mr McBride that planning permission should also be refused over concerns about potential burial grounds of children.
The two proposals are part of a three-part masterplan by EVE to open up a large part of the Bessborough lands for the creation of new communities and a large publicly-accessible parkland area.
A planning application has still to be submitted for the proposed third phase of 200 apartments in a western part of the grounds.
Permissions for the Farms and Meadows schemes were sought under the process for strategic housing developments which obviated the need to first submit an application to Cork City Council.
However, the local authority recommended that EVE’s planning application for the Farm scheme should be approved subject to a number of conditions including the omission of one of the proposed five apartment blocks and a reduction in the height of two other buildings. It also supported the separate plans for the Meadows scheme.
In contrast, elected members of Cork City Council at a meeting in 2022 were generally opposed to both developments due to concerns about historic legacy issues associated with the sites and the appropriateness of the projects.
The Farm scheme had also provided for a new pedestrian/cycle bridge over the Passage West Greenway while two repurposed farmyard buildings were due to be used for some apartment units as well as a creche, library, lounge and function space.
Estuary View Enterprises said it had met with the Cork Survivors & Supporters Alliance (CSSA) at an early stage of the design process for the Farm scheme because of the sensitivity associated with the location.
However, the developer said the locations within the Bessborough lands that were of concern to the group which they wanted preserved were outside the company’s control but that the CSSA had no objection to the principle of the Farm scheme.
