St Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre demolition plan branded ‘a stab in the heart of the city’

Gordon Deegan

If Dublin City Council give the go-ahead to demolish much of the ‘iconic’ St Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre and redevelop it with a €100 million rejuvenation plan, “it will be a stab in the heart of the city”.

That is according to independent member of Dublin City Council, Cllr Mannix Flynn, who is one of 37 parties objecting to the DTDL Ltd rejuvenation plan for the St Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre.

The last day for objections was Thursday, as the city council continues to process the objections received. One objection lodged on behalf of the Save Stephen’s Green Campaign is backed by a petition of 20,000 signatures.

In the Save Stephen’s Green Campaign objection, Yusuf Alraqi states that the petition calling for the building to be preserved “should serve as a barometer for public opinion”.

In a blow to the revised rejuvenation scheme, two of three parties, An Taisce and author and former Irish Times Journalist, Frank McDonald, who successfully appealed to An Coimisúin Pleanála Dublin City Council’s grant of permission in December 2023 to the original €100 million scheme, outlined their opposition to the new plan in comprehensive submissions.

Mr McDonald stated that "the existing shopping centre has been there for nearly 40 years and is in need of rejuvenation, but it does not deserve to be demolished and replaced by an over-scaled new building”.

"Even architects of the quality and status of O’Donnell + Tuomey cannot wave a magic wand to make this behemoth more palatable to the public, nor should they be expected to do so," he said.

Kevin Duff of An Taisce urged that the proposal, "which is predominantly a large and bulky office development lacking sensitivity towards historic St. Stephen’s Green, the Grafton Street Architectural Conservation Area (AC) and Protected Structures of note in the immediate vicinity, is refused permission."

In December, owners of the centre, DTDL Ltd, lodged revised plans for the redevelopment of the St Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre, five months after An Coimiúsin Pleanála refused planning permission for its €100 million revamp.

The designers of the scheme state that the proposal will make an enduring contribution to the city's built environment, setting a new benchmark for brownfield regeneration in the heart of Dublin through its “exemplar standard of urban design”.

The newly designed scheme through the BKD Architects/O’Donnell + Tuomey collaboration will have the capacity to accommodate 3,000 office workers, while the retail floor area at the basement, ground and first floor levels will be 19,001 square metres.

However, in his objection, Cllr Mannix Flynn states that “I believe that this application should be rejected in its entirety. It brings absolutely nothing new to this well known and revered location. It has no regard whatsoever for the present structure and its merits”.

Mr Flynn has described the proposed scheme as “an assault on our senses” and “an eye-sore".

He said: “Let’s not make another office ghetto.”

“I know that Dublin City Council will do the right thing here and reject this plan.”

On the office component to the scheme, Mr Flynn expressed fears that “we will end up with a kind of a Dublin Docklands scenario where the offices once closed will lead to an empty place from 4pm onwards that will tower over the local residential community black and ghostlike”.

Conor McMenamim told the council that “to remove such an iconic landmark of the city to replace it with offices, knowing that nearly a fifth of the offices in the city are vacant, would be a devastating misuse of such a site”.

Seán King of Celbridge said that “the building's exterior is incredibly unique to the Dublin and international landscape. It really is one of a kind and I fear that removing that will make the city's public face worse off”.

Elizabeth O’Donoghue of Geoffrey Keating Rd, D8 has told the council she has a personal connection to the shopping centre “as a teenager with my friends; I had my first date with my husband here; and as a new mother at the end of COVID this was one of the few places I could come”

She told the Council that “the proposed replacement building is generic, bland and looks like a male hygiene product inspired it”.

“Something very similar has already been refused and would further erode Dublin’s architectural character and heritage. Increasingly, Dublin has become a homogenous, boring, streetscape of copy cutter modern developments. The proposed scheme lacks the distinctiveness and cultural value of the existing structure.

Ms O'Donoghue said, “This proposal is about twice the height of the surviving early 18th houses on the south side of the Green”.

A planning report for the applicants by John Spain Associates says that the proposed development “represents a significant rejuvenation and partial redevelopment of a key site at the gateway to Dublin’s south retail core”.

A decision is due on the application next month.

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