01. Newcasle West Local Area Plan ( pdf file - 3593 kb in size)

NEWCASTLE WEST Local Area Plan 20085.1 ContentThe Core Strategy (Section 4) of the Newcastle West LAP isbased on the need to ensure the sustainable planning anddevelopment of the town as a balanced community. Thissection of the LAP contains more detailed developmentmanagement policies covering Housing, Built Environmentand Heritage, Local Economic Development, Communityand Education, Recreation and Natural Environment,Transport and Accessibility, and Services, Flood RiskManagement, Water Services, Flood Risk Management,Waste Management and Energy Consumption andEfficiency. The policies together with the Core Strategy andthe Urban Development Framework will be used to makeconsistent decisions on planning applications.a. Facilitate the anticipated levels of growth of the town inthe long term;b. Provide for a range of house types, sizes and tenuresto meet varying housing needs;c. Provide well designed, attractive, functional andsupervised amenity public open spaces;d. Co-ordinate the provision of road, cycle and pedestriannetworks and other services to new residential areas;c. Provide high quality residential layouts in accordancewith the Urban Development Framework of this Plan;d. Conform with the DoEHLG ‘Sustainable ResidentialDevelopment in Urban Areas 2008’; ande. To promote the phased development of residential landoutward from the town centre, whereby Phase 1allocations are 50% fully developed beforedevelopment on land in Future Phases is permitted.5.2 HousingNew Housing DevelopmentAs described in Section 3.9 of this LAP, the demand forlands to be available for residential development over thenext 6-years and in the longer term has been determined byassessing projected demographic changes withunderstanding the changing role of the town within theCounty Limerick. The lifestyle offered within the towncombined with the range of community / educationalfacilities, employment opportunities, natural setting and highquality environment will continue to contribute to NewcastleWest’s popularity as a residential settlement. Landrequirement calculations are based on an average density of25 units per hectare (75%) and 10 units per hectare (25%) toaccommodate for lower densities where appropriate. Afactor of 2 has been applied to acknowledge that not alllands identified for development will become available overthe plan period and to allow for an element of choice inlocation.Accounting for all lands to be re-zoned from Residential toother uses, and with 39ha of uncommitted residential landswithin the Newcastle West LAP 2001, it is estimated that atotal of 23.6ha of additional residentially zoned lands will berequired for new housing to cater for the predictedpopulation growth of the town during the lifetime of this plan,and a further 48ha of residentially zoned lands over thefollowing 3 years.Policy H1: New Housing DevelopmentIt is the policy of the County Council to ensure that all newhousing developments:Explanation:It is a core objective of this LAP to provide for existing andfuture housing requirements by facilitating residential growthin a way that balances future housing needs with the need toprotect the town’s specific physical and natural qualities.This includes accommodating the various housing needs ofthe existing and future populations that reflect the role of thetown as a local service centre. Therefore, it is considered apriority to provide for sufficient housing units in NewcastleWest that reflect the varying incomes, household sizes,house types and tenures for all housing markets. Thepurpose of phasing is to ensure that the physical and socialinfrastructure required is provided in tandem with theresidential development.Serviced SitesAlthough still predominantly agricultural in character, it isrecognised that the rural areas surrounding Newcastle Westare coming under continuing pressure for one-off urbangenerated housing, including ribbon development along theapproach roads, that can detract from the rural setting of thetown.To help strengthen and consolidate the settlement structureand reverse the decline in the smaller towns and villages inthe County, residential serviced sites will be promoted in thesettlements where services already exist. Residentialserviced sites are also recognised as offering a realalternative to the individuals wishing to build and design theirown houses in small towns and villages rather than the opencountryside. Land has been zoned for such purposes withinthis LAP, in areas located towards the outer edge of thetown boundary.Section 5: DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT POLICIES31