Neasa Hourigan
Question:802. Deputy Neasa Hourigan asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage when he plans to abolish the build-to-rent apartment standards. [17350/23]
View answerTuesday, 18 April 2023
Questions (802)
Written answers
On being appointed Minister in 2020, I undertook a review of co-living development as provided for in the 2018 apartment guidelines document, under the ‘Shared Accommodation’ heading. I concluded that given the scale, location and potential impact of co-living development permitted at that stage, that there were sufficient shared accommodation/co-living units either permitted or subject to consideration within the planning system. Similarly, given the success of measures to generate ‘Build-To-Rent’ (BTR) accommodation and in particular the pipeline of extant permissions for development, I concluded in 2022 that there is no longer a planning rationale to retain BTR as a distinct development type to which certain more flexible design standards than other apartment types may be applied.
Accordingly, the principal feature of the amended ‘Sustainable Urban Housing Guidelines: Design Standards for New Apartments’ planning guidelines, which took effect from the 22nd of December 2022, is the removal of the separate planning application category whereby BTR may be identified as a separate development type, with specific design standards. Subject to transitional provisions for proposals in the planning system prior to publication of the updated Guidelines, the amended set of guidelines now supersede the previous versions. This amendment to the guidelines ensures that all apartment developments, irrespective of the intended end user, are designed to the same minimum standards.