Last week, Orchid Residential, a property development firm owned by the O’Reilly Hylands, said it hopes to build a 220-bed purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) development on a site in Goatstown. It intends to apply for planning permission for the large-scale residential development from Dún Laoghaire Rathdown County Council.
It is understood the proposed PBSA development would represent an additional investment of €30m to build over and above what it cost Orchid to buy the land. The development would include the demolition of a used-car garage on site, with the PBSA building ranging in height from four to six storeys.
CGI illustration of the proposed Goatstown development’s aerial view
In response to the Sunday Independent, Orchid’s Max O’Reilly Hyland said he was delighted to have the opportunity to deliver “critically required student accommodation adjacent to UCD”.
“Dublin is experiencing a crisis in relation to lack of supply of student accommodation,” he said.
“This crisis is having a real-world impact on our student population and is both deterring students from accepting Dublin-based courses and driving decisions to forego attending third-level education.
“We need more PBSA in the city and this Goatstown Road site is a perfect location.”
News in 90 seconds – 15 December 2024
Orchid has already tried to build a 239-bed student accommodation development on the same site.
In late 2020, it lodged an application to build the property with An Bord Pleanála, who granted the proposal the following February.
O’Reilly Hyland said Orchid was also considering delivering student accommodation in other European cities
However, the validity of the permission was queried in the High Court and, on the consent of An Bord Pleanála, was quashed in March 2022.
O’Reilly Hyland said the company was also considering delivering student accommodation in other European cities. He claimed that the cost of delivering student beds in some of these cities was around 30pc to 40pc of the cost of delivery in Ireland.
There is currently a shortage of PBSA across Ireland.
In September, a paper published by the Department of Education showed that publicly owned PBSA was oversubscribed by about 29,773 applications for the 2023/2024 academic year.
“On average, there are three applications for every one student bed on campus,” the paper said. “This does not take into account the Technological University sector. Those students who are unsuccessful in obtaining a place are forced into the private market.”
