Latest news with #HousingForAll
Irish Times
3 days ago
- Business
- Irish Times
Dublin's €70bn infrastructural upgrade: how it breaks down
Despite the development of the M50 , Luas , Dart and the Port Tunnel, Dublin has outgrown its infrastructure and needs a €70 billion investment in housing, transport, water and energy (over 15 years) to catch up. That's according to KPMG . While the figure was used to showcase the consultancy's Dublin 2040 report, published on Wednesday, highlighting what Dublin-based businesses see as the city's strengths and challenges, it wasn't actually contained in the report. KPMG's corporate finance partner Hazel Cryan, however, told The Irish Times that its €70 billion estimate accompanying the report was derived from an analysis of various Government strategies in housing, transport and other sectors. READ MORE [ Dublin needs €70bn investment in infrastructure by 2040 Opens in new window ] 'We've applied an extrapolation out to 2040 based on those reports and what the known big projects very much an estimate,' she said. It breaks down as follows: €30 billion is needed to upgrade the city's transport network as per the Greater Dublin Area Transport Strategy, which includes mega projects like the proposed MetroLink underground rail project. A further €26 billion is earmarked for housing, mainly on the social and affordable projects and targets contained in current Housing for All strategy and beyond. KPMG also reckons that a further €10 billion is needed to upgrade the city's water infrastructure (which is highlighted as a key block on housing development). An additional €6 billion is also necessary to upgrade the city's energy infrastructure to meet the growing demand for electricity and to support the transition to a low-carbon economy, it says. A further €500 million is also needed to upgrade the city's climate risk and flood defence system. All in, a hefty outlay to get the city fit for purpose. KPMG's Dublin 2040 report is based on a survey 300 Dublin-based businesses and what they see as the key priorities. Unsurprisingly the survey found almost 9 in 10 (87 per cent) believe Dublin is doing poorly in the area of housing, reflecting what the report describes as 'the persistent and ubiquitous nature of the issue'. Housing is flagged as the top concern with 60 per cent of businesses seeing affordable accommodation as a critical infrastructure issue ahead of healthcare (20 per cent), public transport (15 per cent) and technology (5 per cent). 'Dublin is beyond an inflection point in a number of critical areas,' said Ryan McCarthy, managing partner at KPMG in Ireland.
CBC
22-05-2025
- General
- CBC
Saint John launches long-awaited green zones to tackle homelessness
Saint John has selected two green zones for transitional housing. The zones are part of Saint John's Housing for All strategy, which aims to reduce homelessness and encampments in the city.
CBC
22-05-2025
- General
- CBC
Saint John greenlights two areas for transitional housing for 54 people
Social Sharing Saint John council has approved a plan for "green zones" to tackle the city's growing homeless population and reduce the number of encampments around the city. The pilot project aims to bring 54 individual transitional housing units to two sites — one off Thorne Avenue and the other nearby on Egbert Street, a small side street off Thorne Avenue. Both are near the Atlantic Superstore and the Church of England Cemetery. On Tuesday night, council voted in favour of the city recommendation to designate the two areas "pilot sites." City staff, Mayor Donna Reardon and various organizations also presented the plan at a media event Wednesday morning. Reardon said it's a significant step. "This strategy reflects our commitment to a people-centred, human-rights-based approach, ensuring that every resident has access to safe, supported and sustainable housing," she said. "The sites are city-owned properties providing legally sanctioned, safe transitional housing for individuals experiencing homelessness." Saint John first announced green, yellow and red zones as a part of its Housing for All strategy in July 2024, in a city-led response to the growing homeless population. Cara Coes, the city's senior manager of community support services, said at Tuesday's council meeting that the 12 Neighbours charity group will be operating the green zones and running their "Neighbourly" project on the sites in order to "rapidly deploy" transitional housing. The two green zones will each have two courtyards, Coes said, that will have individual units for at least 13 people each. Every unit will have a bed, locking doors, heat, lights and internet. Both green zones will be staffed 24/7 and will have shared washroom, laundry, kitchen and multi-purpose facilities. 12 Neighbours also runs a tiny home community in Fredericton. "Each of the units are also equipped with an Android tablet," said Marcel LeBrun, the organization's founder. "That gives people access to services, but also entertainment and things like that ... having communications and those things is very important." LeBrun said people living in the units will be able to live there for free to start. WATCH | 'We all need a warm, dry place we can put our head down' Saint John launches long-awaited green zones to tackle homelessness 8 minutes ago Duration 1:58 "There's no charge to begin with," he said. "We are in discussions between the province and the city about transitioning to moving to paying something because that's part of housing stability. So part of housing stability is you have to learn to pay rent." Future residents will be chosen from the city's co-ordinated access system — a system run by a group of agencies that identifies where to place individuals according to need. The separate courtyards, Coes said, will also allow separation for different needs — such as a wet versus dry courtyard. The plan is to open the Egbert Street site in August and the Thorne Avenue site in December. In March, the Human Development Council said there were 276 people experiencing chronic homelessness in the city. Last June that number was 159. Reardon said the green zones are a result of funding from federal and provincial governments of $3.5 million announced earlier in the year. Plans for other zones not finalized In the Housing For All plan's early stages, green zones were planned to be areas in the city that would allow encampments and would have services such as frontline staff, electricity, heat and garbage pickup. The plan also includes yellow and red zones that haven't been finalized. Yellow zones, according to the plan, are areas that would allow encampments at certain times and red zones are "high risk areas" such as public parks, where encampments wouldn't be permitted. The new green zones will be near the overnight shelter on Rothesay Avenue. The roughly 60-bed shelter — which Coes said will now be a permanent overnight shelter — operated as an out-of-the-cold response during the winter. The sites will also be close to an existing encampment near the rail line that crosses Thorne Avenue near the Superstore. Coun. Gerry Lowe — who represents the ward the zones will be in — was the only councillor to vote against the staff recommendation on Tuesday night. "I like the idea of the green zones," Lowe said. "But the location bothers me as a councillor that has to deal with that area. The amount of break-ins there for the last year have been bad, and the garbage that's left behind," he said. Lowe said he wishes red zones were announced first to have an idea of what areas will have tents removed.
Irish Independent
15-05-2025
- Politics
- Irish Independent
Wexford chief exec admits council needs to ‘get our hands on more land and up our housing delivery in villages'
There may be only three members of Sinn Féin among Wexford's 34 councillors, but they were determined to make their presence felt, and voices heard, at a special meeting held to discuss housing delivery in the county. Prior to the meeting, held in County Hall, Sinn Féin's Tom Forde, Aoife Rose O'Brien, and Craig Doyle, submitted a number of questions to chief executive of WCC Eddie Taaffe regarding ongoing housing issues in Wexford. The first of these focused on the target set by the government's Housing For All plan which requires WCC to deliver 1150 social houses in the county between 2022-26. With the council expected to surpass that target by 30 per cent, the Sinn Féin representatives asked Mr Taaffe if that target was too low.
Irish Independent
12-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
Wexford County Council ‘confident' it will ‘over-deliver' on housing targets set by government
At a special council meeting held to discuss housing delivery in Co Wexford, Mr Taaffe said WCC was on track to exceed the targets set under the government's Housing For All programme which runs from 2022-26. 'Our target for that time period is 1150 builds and 855 of those have been delivered so far,' he said. 'We hope to deliver a further 628 by the end of 2026, that would bring us to approximately 1400 which would be around 30 per cent over our target. However, the message from the department (of housing) has always been that those targets are a minimum requirement and that is the way we have treated them. So we are confident we will over-deliver on those numbers.' Providing some up-to-date figures, Mr Taaffe said the 2024 target for the council was 189 properties of which 56 have been 'delivered to date'. 'We hope to deliver a further 257 this year which would bring us to over 300. Next year our target is 193 and we hope to deliver in excess of 350,' he added. While WCC is continuing to work on housing projects across the county, Mr Taaffe explained that there were a number of ways those on the social housing list could be provided with accommodation. 'People think the only way they're going to get a house is through a new construction, but that's not reflective of our total allocations,' he said. 'Generally we allocate 400-500 properties per year. In 2022 we allocated 611, that was a mixture of new builds, re-lets, transfers, houses from approved housing bodies (AHBs), and a small number of mortgage to rent. 'Under the Housing For All programme approximately 60 per cent of new social houses are to be delivered by local authorities with the remaining 40 per cent provided by AHBs. At the moment we're closer to 50/50, but in the later stages of the programme we will be increasing our own builds.' In addition to these projects, Mr Taaffe said WCC was now in the process of developing affordable housing schemes throughout the county. Under the affordable housing scheme local authority-provided homes are available at a reduced price for first-time buyers whose combined mortgage and deposit will not cover the market price of the newly built home. One such scheme is now 'up and running' in Ramsfort with two smaller schemes in Enniscorthy set to provide 30 homes and one in Wexford town providing ten.
