06 Oct 2016

Imagine Dundrum – September Update

We received a further update from Imagine Dundrum:

We hope you had a pleasant summer. Imagine Dundrum is gearing up for more activity this autumn, and wanted to keep in touch by sending you this short update, along with a new document with request for your feedback.

  1. We trust you received our Imagine Dundrum July 2016 update,sent out in August, detailing what the group has done since May, and have been able to circulate it to your residents’ group and/ or to interested friends and neighbours. If you did not receive this please let us know and we will send on a copy.
  1. Our group has been working on ideas for a Civic, Community and Cultural Space/ Centre which we want to see included as a focal point in the new Dundrum development. Such a centre for Dundrum is fully in line with statements in the new County Development Plan for Dun Laoghaire Rathdown (quoted in the attached document), and our architect has already included a building for this purpose in his set of drawings.

Here attached is our latest draft document for you to read – we very much welcome your ideas, questions and other feedback, if possible by the start of October.

Some of us will be meeting soon with officials in the County Council’s Community Department to discuss this proposal, and then we hope to produce more detailed drawings and suggested square meterage etc for the different aspects of the centre. We will keep you updated.

In the meantime, do get in touch with any ideas you have!

  1. Contacting the developer (Hammerson)– this took longer than we hoped, but Simon Betty, overall manager for Hammerson project in Ireland, with an office base in Dublin, has now received a letter explaining about Imagine Dundrum and its aim of ensuring a strong community voice in the Dundrum development, and we also made contact by phone early last week. We have asked for a meeting with him or one of his colleagues as soon as possible, and hope this can happen in early or mid-October. Our main aims are (a) to learn more about Hammerson’s general plans and schedule for Dundrum, (b) to show them our initiative is serious and that we have concrete proposals to share regarding Dundrum’s future, and (c) to get their agreement in principle that they will engage with the wider Dundrum community as things develop.

In the meantime, as you may know from statements quoted in last Friday’s Irish Times, there are new questions about Hammerson’s overall intentions regarding Dundrum. However, whether they proceed with it as a primarily residential development, or even sell it on to another developer, Imagine Dundrum’s basic aims remain the same, though our strategy may have to change!

We will keep updating you, and look forward to hearing from you. As things develop, we may organise a further open meeting for residents’ groups and interested individuals. In any case, we hope we will continue to have your support and interest.

With all good wishes,

Caroline / Marie for Imagine Dundrum.

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