And now the weather

It has been a tough month. The arrival of the IMF has changed everything. That’s why we decided a fortnight ago that an election is required at the first opportunity. Before that happens we want to approve a budget and the accompanying legislation that allows it to be implemented. Governing requires the making of decisions, and tough ones at that. Currently we’re borrowing two out of every five euro that we pay public servants in wages, and that has to change. The €85 billion in monies from the EU and the IMF gives the State the breathing room to make these adjustments in how Ireland is run in future years. Some of the measures mark a move away from the dangerous boom-time revenues such as stamp duty on housing that we became over-reliant on during the Celtic Tiger years.

 I'm glad that the Four Year Recovery Plan includes a Site Valuation Tax to fund local services, as well as an increase in the price of carbon that will allow us to decrease our dependence on carbon. These reforms can help ensure that Ireland is better placed to weather future economic storms. Meanwhile, as Ireland freezes, it has been a mixed-bag of a first week at the Climate Change talks in Cancun in Mexico. Hopefully week two will lay the ground-work for a comprehensive agreement in South Africa next year. The Guardian has a nifty online calculator allowing you to reduce the UK's carbon footprint here. Closer to home I'm hopeful that our own Climate Change Bill will be published this side of Christmas. Ireland's emissions reduced significantly last year, but the Bill will put the onus on all Government Departments to identify and tackle reductions in emissions in their respective sectors. Over on the "Think or Swim" blog John Gibbons discusses whether climate change is contributing to the big freeze. I'm heartened by the amount of discussion in recent times around the theme of political reform. 

This morning I was alternating between listening to Irish Independent Editor Gerry O'Regan receiving a grilling from Ivan Yeats on Newstalk, and Fintan O'Toole on RTE Radio One discussing his petition to reform Irish politics. O'Regan was getting a hard time for the role of his paper in fueling the fire of property speculation, but he seemed to sidestep the issue by saying that his principle role was to increase newspaper sales which seemed like a fairly honest admission. O'Toole was being pushed as to why he wouldn't run for office himself, but stated that he was happier stimulating debate. I'm in broad agreement with the ten points on O'Toole's petition, and feel his proposal to end clientilism is a good one.

The New Zealand electoral system seems similar to what he is proposing. Half the Parliament there are elected on a list system where you vote for the Party rather than the individual, and half are elected on a system broadly similar to our own, and I feel something along similar lines is appropriate. Perhaps the additional radical step of rewriting the constitution is needed to help draw together the many threads of discussion that are currently taking place on the airwaves and elsewhere. It is something that the people of Iceland have embarked upon, and could be a way to tackle parliamentary reform, as well as enshrining ideas around equality, property and family rights that have been much debated over the last few years. In the meantime 7th December is Budget day, and I'm hoping that Brian Lenihan will carry through on some of the reforms that we've been discussing with him that were mentioned by the Tanaiste on the Week in Politics last Sunday.

Blessed are the Cheese-makers

I was on the Sligo train yesterday morning to the Walking Matters Conference and missed Brendan Smith's interview on Morning Ireland, but I was delighted to hear that Irish cheese was in the headlines, albeit perhaps not for the best of reasons.

A fortnight ago I met some great Irish cheese-makers at the TerraMadre event in Turin. Terra Madre is held in conjunction with the Salone de Gusto in Italy every two years and is the brain-child of Carlo Petrini and others from the "Slow Food" movement. In essence it provides a focus on food that is "good, clean and fair." He first came to prominence in the 1980s for taking part in a campaign against the fast food chain McDonald's opening near the Spanish Steps in Rome. In more recent years he has brought more more than 6,000 delegates together to promote biodiversity, provide better food education and connect producers.

Given that I have responsibility for organics and horticulture in Brendan Smith's Department. I was keen to learn more about Petrini's work. Interestingly food, and food tourism has helped turn the city of Turin around. A generation ago Fiat employed 55,000 people in Turin manufacturing cars. These days it is closer to 5,000 and the City of Turin, and surrounding Province of Piemonte has made a conscious decision to create and sustain jobs through the food industry. It seems to be working and the strong media coverage of the Conferences showed the pride of the Region and the City in its transformation. There Irish Raw Milk Cheese Presidium had taken a stand to market seven great Irish Cheeses, and Bord Bia also had taken space to market some great Irish beef, lamb, salmon and cheeses. They also were showcasing some of the great new Irish artisan products such as Irish sea salt from the Beara peninsula in Cork, as well as relishes and mustards. Italy is the fourth largest market for Irish Agriculture and there was strong interest in sampling our exports.

I paid a visit on the Saturday morning to an enormous outside food market in one of the main squares of Turin, and it showed the tremendous scope for expansion for Irish farmers' markets to provide an alternative to the supermarket multiples. David McWilliams wrote in the Sunday Business Post recently that "The recovery will be more GAA than IDA, less bond market, more farmer's market", and I tend to agree.

I met up with Alice Waters the Californian chef and activist and we discussed the importance of healthy eating policies. Vandana Shiva was also there from India, and she discussed the connections between soil, ecology and human rights.

Closer to home Darina Allen was there wearing"Slow Food Ireland" hat, as well as Michael Kelly from the "Grow it Yourself" movement. While Darina has been a strong campaigner for Irish food for many years, the overnight success of Michael's campaigning has been fantastic. His campaign to get people growing more of their own food in an allottment or the back garden has really blossomed in the last few years.

I spoke at a "European Schools for Healthy Food" event on Sunday. While most Irish schools don't have their own canteens, we have introduced food into the curriculum through the Food Dudes and Agri-Aware's Incredible Edibles projects. In addition An Taisce through the Green Flag program has encouraged the development of school gardens as a way of introducing students to environmental issues.

The two days in Italy allowed Irish producers to learn more about selling quality food abroad, as well as learn from success stories around the world. Ireland's indigenous food sector, as Oliver Moore pointed out recently in the Irish Examiner, is a key to our recovery, and is demonstrating a very different kind of business model. Bord Bia is doing good work to assist new food businesses through their Vantage Program, and judging from Turin, there's huge scope for development. Not only are the cheese-makers blessed, they're out their creating jobs for Ireland.

The Pic? That's Ralph Haslam from Mossfield Farm, the overall winner at the Bord Bia Organic Awards this year sampling his amazing Gouda style cheese.

Planning for Communities

Well, we now have the numbers.

There are 33,000 vacant units across the State, according to the National Housing Development Survey and an additional 10,000 units under construction.

It’s not much consolation to families living in unfinished estates, but I had thought the figure would be higher.

At the height of the boom we were building 90,000 units per year, and last year the figures were around 25,000.Even at this lower output figure the amount of vacancy is less than two years supply.

I suspect the housing units close to our main towns and cities will be occupied sooner than other developments. Just last week in Booterstown in Dún Laoghaire empty apartments were being snapped up at bargain prices, albeit at a massive discount. The units furthest away from where the new jobs are will be the more difficult to sell. Certainly the blanket use of tax designations in entire counties was flawed. It was naive at best to assume that property based tax incentives could lift all boats in economically depressed areas.

Someone suggested at last week’s Irish Planning Institute Conference that we had seen the end of apartment building and a return to the semi-detached house. I doubt it. I think what we will see is an end to the badly-designed slapped-up so-called ‘luxury developments’ surrounded by a sea of car parking in a field that was owned by someone who knew someone three miles down the road. That can only be a good thing. The new planning laws promote well-designed buildings in the appropriate location. We’ll see more mixed-use developments; terraced housing, and well-insulated homes closer to shops, schools and the workplace. That can only be a good thing.

Many of the empty housing units will eventually come under the control of the National Assets Management Agency (NAMA), and the survey information will be of benefit to the NAMA as well as to Planning Authorities. We’re putting in place a Housing Expert Group chaired by John O’Connor of the Housing and Sustainable Communities Agency. Their first job is to approve a Manual prepared by planning and housing experts in the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government within the next few weeks that will assist agencies in managing the legacy of unfinished and empty housing units.

We need to be careful not to see empty housing units as a neat solution to local authority housing waiting lists. Many of these developments weren't designed with the needs of vulnerable housing clients in mind. Hopefully the lessons of 'sink' estates have been well and truly learnt by now. I had a good meeting with Fr. Pat Coogan from Respond a few weeks ago. I asked him what would he do if a hundred empty homes became available. He said he'd take twenty houses and use two of them to provide communal facilities and use the other eighteen as social housing. He'd then sell the other eighty to homesteaders who might purchase the homes for a knock-down price and put down roots in the community. Both groups of residents would support each other. I thought it was a valid proposal, and I'm sure will figure in the discussions that the NAMA and other agencies have over the coming months.

Currently there are strong powers available to the Health and Safety Authority to take action on sites that are still under construction. In addition Councils have powers under the Derelict Sites Act, the Dangerous Buildings Act and Litter legislation. Also, under the 2010 Planning Act we’ve given Councils and residents additional powers to “take in charge” parts of unfinished development. We’ll also be clarifying the powers available to Planning Authorities to use bonds or securities to ensure that works are finished off in housing areas.

If you’re living in an unfinished development chances are you’ve already looked at the plans in the Council offices and compared them to the reality of what’s been built. It’s important to itemise the problems and discuss them with the solicitor who handled the sale. They can advise you on what action to take. The primary responsibility for completion of a development lies with the developer, but if they’re not responding, you should take the issue up with the Council directly. The Manual that is being finalised by the Expert Group will assist Councils in using their legal powers to improve unfinished developments. Over the next few months Council’s around the country will be required to prepare Site Resolution Plans for all unfinished developments in consultation with the Expert Group, the developers, residents and other key stakeholders.

Other Government Departments can use this detailed survey to help them with their work. The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation and the IDA can use the data to show prospective employers where there is ready availability of housing . Other Departments such as Education, and Arts, Sports and Tourism may find the information useful in thinking ahead. Some of the dwellings may well find a future as holiday homes. Others may become student accommodation.

From the Green Party’s perspective much of our work has involved reforming the planning system to ensure that past mistakes are not repeated. Over the last year we’ve put in place a “refreshed” National Spatial Strategy, new Regional Planning Guidelines and a new Planning Act. We’ve also put measures in place to protect habitats and water supplies. In addition we’ve witnessed a halt to decentralisation, and a windfall tax on land that is rezoned. The recession has given us an unprecedented opportunity to learn from past mistakes and put in place policies that concentrate the right kind of development in the right locations.

An 80% windfall tax on “up-zoned” land which forms part of the NAMA legislation, dramatically reduces the incentive from land-owners to seek the rezoning of their land. This is as close as we’ve been able to get to the implementation of the 1973 Kenny Report without a constitutional referendum.

Joined-up planning policies have also been a focus of the reforms. Minister Gormley and I have put in place closer links between the National Development Plan and the National Spatial Strategy; Regional Planning Guidelines at the inter-county level , and City and County Development Plans and Local Area Plans at a local level. That may not sound ground-breaking, but if you saw some Local Area Plans you might be scratching your head wondering at to how they reflect national policies.
Most of the provisions of the Planning Act 2010 passed into law a couple of weeks ago. The new law puts an onus on Councils to review their plans within a two year period and ensure that the plan has an evidence-based core strategy. This will lead to a change from the laissez-faire plans of the past which failed to deliver on their stated goals.

Of course there’s also a process of education needed to up-skill elected representatives and officials. The Irish Planning Institute ran a well-attended seminar last week, and the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government has plans for regional information sessions around the country over the months ahead. In the UK the Royal Town Planning Institute runs a school for councillors back-to-back with their professional conference and I’m hoping to do something similar here.

The Scottish educationalist Patrick Geddes summed it up many years ago in three words – “Survey, analysis, plan”. For far too long we built without connecting these three essential elements.

Now is the time to get things right.

Taking the Luas to Bride's Glen and beyond

It was a good day, and there’s not too many of them around at the moment.

The Luas extension from Sandyford to Cherrywood was opening. I was saying a few words wearing my hat as Minister of State with responsibility for Smarter Travel and I took the opportunity to reflect as well as look forward.

Back in the 1980s decision makers seemed to feel that new roads could overcome any transportation problem. It was a mad time. In Dublin City, Dublin Corporation (renamed Dublin City Council in the late 1990s) was buying up old buildings left right and centre, knocking them and building roads. Thriving pubs, shops and homes were acquired, de-tenanted and then demolished. I was a student architect back then in UCD and we campaigned against these crazy policies. Meanwhile, in contrast to Dublin, cities elsewhere in Europe were building new tram systems and protecting older neighbourhoods. Cities like Grenoble and Nantes in France had put in place new light rail systems and they were working well. A friend of mine Jerome O’Drisceoil made up button badges with the simple slogan “Trams not Jams” and we gradually made our voices heard. The late Simon Perry in Trinity College exposed the folly of new road building in urban areas, and was an eloquent voice calling for rail investment. Finally the then Government commissioned the Dublin Transportation Initiative Study that led to a study advocating the construction of three light rail lines in Dublin. Two were built and we’re now proposing a Metro and Dart inter-connector that will provide further North-South and East-West links for the Capital.

The Luas Green Line which runs from Stephen’s Green in the City Centre South to Sandyford doubled in length last week. It now runs as far as Cherrywood in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. Around 26,000 additional residents live within one kilometre of the new stretch of line. Although some of the line runs through open countryside, most of the land is scheduled for development. At Cherrywood a Strategic Development Zone has been approved by Government under the 2000 Planning Act, and this allows for the fast-tracking of new development. Unlike the development of much of West Dublin where the housing was put in before the public transport, here we’ve put in place a high quality public transport link before many of the new communities are built. I pointed out in my speech at the opening that this was one of the rare examples in Irish planning where we’ve actually put the horse before the cart rather than the other way around. There was criticism at the opening at the lack of Park and Ride facilities being ready, but a large parking facility is due to open early next year at Carrickmines. There’s also a car park planned at Cherrywood, but it has been delayed due to the NAMA taking over loans relating to certain properties there. The lands at Cherrywood are scheduled for development as a new town in future years, so we have to be careful that we don’t take over key sites there on a permanent basis for surface car parking. The Bus/ Luas connections aren’t as good as I would like, and maybe there’s a role for the National Transport Authority to review this and suggest changes. However the 63 bus route now links up with the Luas which should work well. There’s also a role for the Council and the other agencies to improve walking and cycling access to the stops, as well putting in place some decent signage pointing out where the stops are.

The opening of this Luas extension was a good day for Smarter Travel, and for Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. The extension came in at €293 million, under the €324 million approved budget. The project has created and is sustaining ‘Green Collar” jobs at every skill level from cleaners to line managers. A journey on the Luas requires one tenth the energy of a car, and that all helps tackle climate change.

Looking ahead, I’m working on the next step of extending the line as far as Shankill and Bray. Bride’s Glen is the last stop on the line, and Loughlinstown Hospital lies just across the old stone rail viaduct that spans the Shanganagh River that runs through the glen after which the stop is named. The alignment of the old Harcourt Street Railway line is still there, and although one or two buildings were allowed to straddle the line it would be comparatively easy to acquire the lands and put the line back in place. Ideally the Metro Project would eventually run between Swords and Bray, creating a backbone along which the city could develop over the next hundred years. I finished up my few words at the opening by quoting from Daniel Burnham –the American planner who produced the Chicago Plan in the nineteenth century. He stated:

“Make no little plans, they have no courage to stir men’s blood and probably will not be realised. Aim high in life and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram, once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency.

Remember that our sons and grandsons will do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty, think big.”

If you remove Burham’s gender bias, I think you’ve a decent enough quote that can guide the proposals for the Metro and the Dart Interconnector . In tandem with the right planning and development decisions they have the capacity to change the face of Dublin for the better over the next hundred years.