Dublin is to get much needed social housing with news that a public housing development is to be built in the city.

The public-private partnership (PPP) scheme will be the first since the collapse of the scheme in 2008.

In mid May, Alcove Properties was given the go-ahead for the regeneration of Dublin City Council's Charlemont Street flat complex near Ranelagh, parts of which date back to the 1940s.

An Bord Pleanála agreed that the project could involve the demolition of almost 200 flats on a five-acre site on Charlemont Street and Tom Kelly Road, most of which were built in the late 1950s apart from one block, Ffrench-Mullan House, which was built in 1944.

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The vacant site of the former St Ultan's flats, demolished in 2001, is also part of the development.

Some 253 apartments will be built, 139 of which will be social housing units, 16 will be offered under the affordable housing scheme and the remaining 105 will be private apartments.

Shops, restaurants, a sports centre and a multiplex cinema will also be included in the scheme. Unlike previous social housing developments, it will have a significant office space element of about 20,000sq m.

The developer had applied to build five blocks ranging up to eight storeys in height, but in granting permission An Bord Pleanála directed that the maximum height of any block would be six storeys.

The Irish Times reported that the board also reduced the number of apartments permissible from 260 to 253, and ordered the alteration of five two-bedroom apartments to larger one-bed units.

(BMcC/GK)