Dublin’s retail centre was given a boost yesterday when planning authority An Bord Pleanála granted full planning permission for the 800,000 sq ft, retail-led Dublin Central development on the city’s iconic O’Connell Street.

Department store group John Lewis will anchor the €900m scheme with a new 240,000sq ft store facing O’Connell Street and developer Chartered Land has pledged to ensure completion by 2016, in time for centenary celebrations of the 1916 Easter Rising.

The former Carlton site has lain derelict for more than 20 years and a number of attempts have been made to assemble the site for a major regeneration scheme in accordance with the Dublin City Development Plan.

Chartered Land has now completed both the site assembly and secured planning consent for Dublin Central, the first city centre retail scheme to get the go ahead in Dublin since completion of the Jervis Street shopping centre in 1996.

Chartered Land part owns shopping centre Swords Pavilions, Dundrum Town Centre and Dublin’s refurbished ILAC Centre, all in and around the Dublin area.

Chartered Land chief executive Dominic Deeny said: “The decision means we will be able to deliver a major retail-led evelopment for Dublin that will complete the regeneration of O’Connell Street and reposition it as the nation’s premier retail street again.”

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