Article about gated developments

jd

http://www.independent.ie/business/personal-finance/property-mortgages/a-race-to-get-gated-does-living-in-a-gated-development-really-cut-down-on-crime-30545371.html

I noticed this bit

Kenna argues that by passing a piece of legislation called the Multi-Units Development Act in 2011, which obliged developers to pass ownership of common areas to the owners' management company, the state may have given residents greater power to restrict public access.

"It allowed private ownership of residential common areas, and once they own those areas, they can do what they want," she said.

I'm still scratching my head on this one, I'm not sure what alternative there is (besides developers holding on to the common areas!)

shruikan2553

I don't see what the problem is. Break ins in the area, put up a gate so random people can't come in. I don't see why wanting to protect your house and contents is wrong.

jd

shruikan2553 wrote: »

I don't see what the problem is. Break ins in the area, put up a gate so random people can't come in. I don't see why wanting to protect your house and contents is wrong.

I agree with you. I wonder what alternative would Therese Kenna have regarding common areas for apartments etc.

Dob74

Where are we living south Africa. despite the impression given by the media Ireland has a low level of crime. personally nothing says I'm paranoid or I think everyone else is a low life than living in a gated community. apartments excluded

Wabbit Ears

We've had a massive amount of break-ins and car thefts in our area of recent, to the extent of community patrols being setup. If gating the estate was an option, I would completely be in favour of it!

shruikan2553

Dob74 wrote: »

Where are we living south Africa. despite the impression given by the media Ireland has a low level of crime. personally nothing says I'm paranoid or I think everyone else is a low life than living in a gated community. apartments excluded

What's the difference between a gated community and apartments? I've never lived in a gated community but I would guess the idea is to keep people out who shouldn't be there anyway.

peter_dublin

I think the difference is in apartment its generally common areas are gated, much as you gate your drive way and have a private back garden in an apartment complex the outside common areas amount to the only space tenants have. From the article it seems they have gates and possibly high fences around their houses but wanted to close off access to the actual estate itself so you wouldn't be able to walk past the houses in the first place. So it is gated houses within a gated estate.

Mrs OBumble

jd wrote: »

I'm still scratching my head on this one, I'm not sure what alternative there is (besides developers holding on to the common areas!)

What happens when the council takes an estate in charge? I would have thought that the internal roads and green areas become council property - but I could be mistaken.

The_Conductor

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

What happens when the council takes an estate in charge? I would have thought that the internal roads and green areas become council property - but I could be mistaken.

The council would be petitioned to take a particular development in charge.
It is inspected, and a list of actions needed to bring the property up to a spec the council are satisfied with, is generated.
The developer and/or management company- completes the works list.
The council takes the property in charge- and all publicly accessible areas under their charge, become public property.

In some (limited number of cases) the constituent management company in which the common areas are vested- are wound down as part of the process, and their assets become vested in the Minister for Finance.

There isn't a definitive set of steps to having an estate taken in charge though- most councils have their own rules- and what is perfectly satisfactory to one council could be completely unacceptable to another.

gctest50

jd wrote: »

I noticed this bit

Kenna argues that by passing a piece of legislation called the Multi-Units Development Act in 2011, which obliged developers to pass ownership of common areas to the owners' management company, the state may have given residents greater power to restrict public access.

"It allowed private ownership of residential common areas, and once they own those areas, they can do what they want," she said.


I'm still scratching my head on this one, I'm not sure what alternative there is (besides developers holding on to the common areas!)

I can't see anything wrong with that ?

Unless you live there, are visiting , collecting/delivering/installing stuff you've no business nosing around

Lantus

what local authorities take in charge can vary hugely and its very specific to each development. Typically it would be the roads, sewers, street lights but cash strapped councils wont be keen to take on 'private property' to maintain and no amount of petitioning from the OMC will force them to take it in charge. The idea of OMCs and their proliferation was to free coco's from the burden of maintaining estates.

Also MUD act only gave a timeline to enforce already existing law and processes in relation to common areas. Its didn't create anything new in that regard.

markpb

The part of the article that mentions the MUD act is a load of toss. The lands that apartments sit on are always privately owned, sometimes by the developer, sometimes by the OMC. MUD act didn't change that. And even if it did, it doesn't give the owner of the land any more permission to gate it than any other piece of land, it always requires planning permission.

davo10

Dob74 wrote: »

Where are we living south Africa. despite the impression given by the media Ireland has a low level of crime. personally nothing says I'm paranoid or I think everyone else is a low life than living in a gated community. apartments excluded

I live in a gated community. Security gates close automatically at 9pm at night and open at 8am. Residents have fob keys to open gates.

There are 32 houses in the estate, not one burglary in 8 years, no young fellas in cars driving in and out, no nosey people driving in to have a look. When I'm away my wife feels that she and the kids are safe because those gates are closed. If a burgler tried to rob the place, he would have to leave the car outside the gate, walk 100m up an avenue and then back down again with whatever he stole all the while an alarm would be blaring.

Paranoia? You betcha, I'd prefer to have a little paranoia than a knife to my throat.

Thoie

I live in an apartment building that could be considered "gated" (key fobs, intercom systems to get in). However people get in all the time, mostly by just following someone else in through the gates. Irish people in general are just too polite to stop other people coming in after them (particularly true in a large building where you can't know every single person).

Gates may stop someone wandering through a place as a shortcut, but don't stop people getting into the building, getting access to the postboxes etc in general.

Victor

shruikan2553 wrote: »

I don't see what the problem is. Break ins in the area, put up a gate so random people can't come in. I don't see why wanting to protect your house and contents is wrong.

One important factor about gated developments is that blocking entry to non-residents means you block access to ordinary people - dog walkers, children going for a cycle, etc. This removes passive surveillance and facilitates would-be ne'er-do-wells.

athtrasna

It's also not as if the management company can just put up gates. They require planning permission and certain local authorities will not grant it. I live in Fingal and their position is open and inclusion and will not grant pp for gates.

There's also the cost factor, gates are expensive to run and maintain.

the_syco

From the article;

A spokeswoman for Dublin City Council said its latest development plan aims to "ensure that gated residential developments will be discouraged and, in most cases, will be prohibited as they negate Dublin City Council's vision of a permeable, connected and linked city that encourages integration".

Having read about the chaos of broken gates, with homeless people squatting in the underground carpark, and youths congregating in groups on the grounds of the apartment complex, I think the "vision" will make less people wanting to buy an apartment in Dublin!

As for the comment from Kieran Rose (a senior planner at Dublin City Council) in the article;

There are cases where local pedestrians don't have access

Unless the estate was used as a shortcut from A to B, why would they want to walk through the estate? Is it possible that the people bought houses in the gated estate because they disliked people walking through their estate? A road nearby me is used as a shortcut by people. Cars are regularly vandalised, windows of houses broken, houses egged, and sometimes graffiti is done, but nothing is done about it. I'd say if the residents could gate the area, they would.

The_Conductor

In the vast majority of cases- the arguments for or against, are moot. The residents do not own the land, period. In most modern gated communities- the communal areas- are owned by the residents, through their vestiture in a Management Company. They are private property, not public property. The entire arguments for, or against- are thus futile.

the world wonders

the_syco wrote: »

Having read about the chaos of broken gates, with homeless people squatting in the underground carpark, and youths congregating in groups on the grounds of the apartment complex, I think the "vision" will make less people wanting to buy an apartment in Dublin!

There's a big difference between closing off an entire district and closing off the grounds of an apartment complex.

Unless the estate was used as a shortcut from A to B, why would they want to walk through the estate?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permeability_%28spatial_and_transport_planning%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fused_Grid
tl;dr: estates that are open to the outside world have various benefits, including encouraging sustainable transport. Clearly the planners at DCC are aware of this...

The_Conductor wrote:

In the vast majority of cases- the arguments for or against, are moot. The residents do not own the land, period. In most modern gated communities- the communal areas- are owned by the residents, through their vestiture in a Management Company. They are private property, not public property. The entire arguments for, or against- are thus futile.

1. they still need planning permission to put up gates
2. a public right of way may exist over private property

SpaceTime

I briefly lived in an apartment in one of these gated communities and one of the biggest problem was the gate itself.
The development was in an extremely safe part of Cork City, so I don't think there was really any logic in having a gate in the first place.

However, what happened was the gate would remain open for a few minutes after someone had pressed the open button on the intercoms and then sometimes delivery vans (including An Post) would drive in not realising the gate was going to close behind them.

There was no way of opening the gate from the inside other than with the use of a remote control key fob or by pressing buttons on the intercoms which were only working in some of the apartments and were quite poorly maintained.

The result was that on numerous occasions delivery vans got locked inside the complex.

There was a pedestrian exit gate, but that's not much use if you're a van.

We also had a situation where wandering dogs got locked in quite a lot.

Then to make matters worse, An Post had been provided with a key fob but, because there were multiple postal workers working the route they didn't always have it. So, the result was we frequently only got mail once a week and you had to pick up urgent items from the sorting office!

I got the impression they may have had a delivery van stuck in the complex one morning too which resulted in them not wanting to drive in anymore.

I was also very concerned about how fire services would access the complex in the event of a fire as they were HUGE gates and there's now way you'd just force them open too easily. It would be even more difficult for ambulance services as they're unlikely to have any powerful gear to push them open.

Gates are all fine and well where there's an actively managed complex like a business park where there's usually a security hut at the gate. But, for small residential complexes, I think you can be getting into crazy stuff.

seamus

davo10 wrote: »

Paranoia? You betcha, I'd prefer to have a little paranoia than a knife to my throat.

That's paranoia on a "go see a doctor, I think you have a problem" level, though. Ireland is just not that dangerous that it requires us to lock ourselves in fortresses.

Ultimately, as Victor points out, closing your community in behind gates just makes it much quieter and therefore easier for thieves to act undisturbed. Unless you're willing to pay for a 24/7 security firm to roam the estate, gates are of little use and probably make it more dangerous, not less.

Anyone I know who lives behind gates has constant problems with dumping, abandoned vehicles, homeless people & drug addicts, not to mention the fact that the gates are pretty much constantly breaking because the aforementioned people hold them or force them open and break the mechanism.
The fact that it's private land is what makes it attractive - the council can't fine you for illegal dumping, and you will never see a Garda unless someone calls one.

I know of one guy who tried to stop a gang of scumbags from entering his upmarket apartment block and got a severe battering for his trouble - from the drug-dealing tenant of the apartment block who was inviting the gang in for a party.

So gates could just as easily be locking the scumbags in out of sight rather than keeping them out.

The_Conductor

Paranoia or not- it knocks 200 a year off the renewal of my car insurance......

hmmm

I lived in a fairly rough area of Dublin for a good few years in a gated apartment complex and it was the only thing that made it livable. Yes it "divided communities", i.e. those of us who had paid for our apartments and cars versus those who were trying to get in and rob from us. There was of course a bit of theft and vandalism, but it would have been an awful lot worse without the gates being there considering the state of the streets outside the complex.

If there is a balance to be found in security versus "integration", I'd like the balance to come down on the side of those who are the ones making a contribution to society.

The Spider

hmmm wrote: »

I lived in a fairly rough area of Dublin for a good few years in a gated apartment complex and it was the only thing that made it livable. Yes it "divided communities", i.e. those of us who had paid for our apartments and cars versus those who were trying to get in and rob from us. There was of course a bit of theft and vandalism, but it would have been an awful lot worse without the gates being there considering the state of the streets outside the complex.

If there is a balance to be found in security versus "integration", I'd like the balance to come down on the side of those who are the ones making a contribution to society.

Don't know where I stand on this, but years ago I lived in a gated development in Harolds Cross, and anytime the gates broke down or didn't close, it was like an invasion, drug addicts, homeless etc would make a beeline for the houses and begin knocking on doors looking for money etc, also had the window of my car put in by someone lobbing a brick over the fence.

Never had this experience anywhere else I lived where people literally knocked on the door looking for cash, and the thing is you answered the door because you thought it was a neighbour, because the gates should have kept everyone out.

Dob74

davo10 wrote: »

I live in a gated community. Security gates close automatically at 9pm at night and open at 8am. Residents have fob keys to open gates.

There are 32 houses in the estate, not one burglary in 8 years, no young fellas in cars driving in and out, no nosey people driving in to have a look. When I'm away my wife feels that she and the kids are safe because those gates are closed. If a burgler tried to rob the place, he would have to leave the car outside the gate, walk 100m up an avenue and then back down again with whatever he stole all the while an alarm would be blaring.

Paranoia? You betcha, I'd prefer to have a little paranoia than a knife to my throat.

JC where do you live that you have to gates around your estate to stop someone putting a knife to your throat?

davo10

seamus wrote: »

That's paranoia on a "go see a doctor, I think you have a problem" level, though. Ireland is just not that dangerous that it requires us to lock ourselves in fortresses.

.

Burglers will nearly always check a house out before they rob it. Alarms do not stop someone breaking into your house, but they do draw attention to a break in and make it more difficult to escape un noticed.

A burgler who would break in to my home at night has to either be buzzed in or leave their car outside and walk a considerable distance to and from my house. If they are buzzed in, or follow someone in, they then have to try and get out all the while my alarm will be blaring.

You don't have to be paranoid to be concerned about what you see and read. Having a gate isn't locking yourself in a fortress, it's having a gate so that only residents and their guests are admitted.

L'Enfer du Nord

The last 100 years has seen a progressive walling in of suburban housing in Ireland. If you look at Clontarf, Drumcondra or Mount Merrion you see there aren't many Cul-de-sacs in the areas developed before 1950. There's a network of joint up roads which is handy for pedestrians. However to be fair you need speed bumps etc. to control traffic speed. From the 1950s to the 70s you start to have more Cul-De-Sacs (see Tallagh for example) but there are also loads of lanes and greens between them so pedestrians can still get to Bus stops shops etc. quite easily. Also entrance to developments from this era are fairly open. Come the eighties and nineties developments start to have walls around them and gate pillars (if not gates), by the mid 1990s 'shortcuts' linking estates seem to have been designed out. Go down a 1970s cul-de-sac there's a reasonable chance that there be a lane or little green at the end linking to an other road, come the 1990s forget about it, there's only one way in and out of an estate and its designed for cars. The logical next step is putting in gates.

It's worth noting that what are considered some of the most desirable parts of the city are pre-wall/gate. Various reason for this of course but the presence of lanes and short cuts doesn't put people off Rathgar, Rathmines, Ranelagh.

One individual gated estate may feel safer but imagine a future where each development of 20-150 units has its own walls and gates. No one lives on main roads, most shared public space is for cars and there are very few pedestrians, any pedestrian is suspect. As has been suggested you'll need some thing extra to have the competitive edge in the security stakes.

Rather than police or punish crime and anti-social behavior we're trying to design it out. This won't work.

hmmm

L'Enfer du Nord wrote: »

Rather than police or punish crime and anti-social behavior we're trying to design it out. This won't work.

It's one of the obvious reactions to a justice system that isn't doing its job - better people put up a few gates rather than try and enforce justice themselves. People should have a right to feel safe and secure in their own homes, and I'm not at all sure why they should be forced by bureaucrats to "integrate" as part of some social experiment.

The government doesn't own us.

L'Enfer du Nord

hmmm wrote: »

It's one of the obvious reactions to a justice system that isn't doing its job - better people put up a few gates rather than try and enforce justice themselves. People should have a right to feel safe and secure in their own homes, and I'm not at all sure why they should be forced by bureaucrats to "integrate" as part of some social experiment.

The government doesn't own us.

"Integrate" with what?

It's gated communities which are the experiment as opposed to not having them which has been the norm in cities for centuries. Cities by their nature are integrated.