The High Court has dismissed a developer’s challenge to the refusal of planning permission for 99 build-to-rent apartments at Canterbury Gate in Mulhuddart, Dublin 15.
Mr Justice Richard Humphreys delivered judgment on 21 November 2025 in proceedings brought by AAI Baneshane Limited against An Coimisiún Pleanála, with Fingal County Council as notice party.
The proposed development was Phase 1 of a wider scheme. A separate application covered 91 apartments in Phase 2. The combined project followed an earlier strategic housing development application which had been refused in 2022.
Fingal County Council refused both later applications in 2022. On appeal, the commission’s inspector recommended permission, but the commission rejected that recommendation and refused both phases in November 2024.
For Phase 1, the commission found that the overall two-phase scheme would produce a net density of 184 dwellings per hectare and considered the site insufficiently accessible to high-frequency public transport for that density. It also considered Phase 1, viewed independently, to represent a poor disposition of units across the overall site.
AAI Baneshane argued that the commission had misapplied the 2024 Compact Settlements Guidelines, inadequately explained its departure from the inspector and wrongly declined to impose a condition requiring the two phases to be developed together.
Humphreys J rejected those grounds. He found that material before the commission, including the developer’s own transport documents, was capable of supporting the conclusion that the site did not meet the relevant accessibility test. Any deficiency in reasons on that issue was therefore not material.
The judge also held that the commission could reasonably assess Phase 1 on the basis that Phase 2 might never be built. While it had power to impose a condition linking the developments, it was not legally obliged to redesign or rescue the application through conditions.
The judicial review was dismissed, with a provisional proposal that there be no order as to costs unless a party applied otherwise.