The Irish Times

Completion of the O'Connell Street regeneration project has been delayed to "an extraordinary degree" by the ongoing legal proceedings over the former Carlton cinema site, Dublin city manager John Fitzgerald has said. The disused cinema and an adjacent derelict lot have been described by Mr Fitzgerald as "the most important site in the entire city", yet it remains undeveloped because of legal wrangling between the owners and the council, and involving the owners themselves. The council made a compulsory purchase order of the site in December 2001, after determining that the Carlton Group of landowners, who had secured planning for the site in 1999, had neither the finance nor expertise to advance the project.