14 cottages are to be redeveloped as part of the project.

A group of 100-year-old cottages in various states of derelict are to be brought back into use as part of a €4 million restoration scheme, the Irish Times has reported. The houses which are located on Portrane Avenue were previously owned by the HSE and had been used to house workers from the nearby St Ita’s psychiatric hospital. The HSE agreed to hand the houses over to Fingal County Council so that they could be redeveloped for social housing. The houses are mainly single-storey two-bed cottages, with two three-bed cottages, and two two-storey houses, one a two bed and one with three bedrooms. The properties have been vacant for around 20 years and are currently in various states of derelict - some have experienced fire damage, and collapsed roofs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3wKRem16wU The houses are outside the entrance of St Ita’s and are part the hospital’s architectural conservation area, meaning the council will have to adhere to heritage protection standards during their redevelopment. Speaking to the Times, Robert Burns of Fingal County Council said:

They are in an architectural conservation area which means we’re restricted as to what we can do, so demolishing those properties was never an option even though some were in very poor condition.  The only route back for them was to restore and conserve the properties. We’ve done a lot of work around bringing them back to their core design. We’ve removed old extensions and anything there that wouldn’t have been good quality, and the properties are being conserved very much in line and in the spirit of how they were built.

The estimated cost of redevelopment is between €150,000 and €400,000 per house, depending on their condition with an average cost of €285,000. Header image via YouTube/fingalcoco READ NEXT: Thousands queue at the Capuchin Day Centre for food vouchers