Windyhall houses in Letterkenny taking an ‘exceptionally long time’ to complete

The development of nine houses in Windyhall, Letterkenny, is taking an “exceptionally long time” to complete.

The comments came from Cllr Gerry McMonagle of Letterkenny-Milford MD at a recent special plenary meeting of Donegal County Council on housing.

While Cllr McMonagle welcomed the news that 511 social housing developments are currently on site across the county, he said it seemed to be taking “an awful long time” to get housing units built and allocated to families.

“There’s nine houses in Windyhall, and it’s taking an exceptionally long time to build nine houses on that site,” said Cllr McMonagle. “I’ve asked on a number of occasions as to what the delays are. Now I’ve seen they’ve started building the final four again but it’s taking a long time.

Cllr McMonagle also urged the council to engage with developers about acquiring and allocating out completed houses in Ard na Gréine, Letterkenny

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“There are 12 houses currently in Letterkenny that are completed in Ard na Gréine,” he said. “We’ve all had discussions about it. To be honest I think it’s a bit remiss of us as council to not enter into meaningful discussions and negotiations with that developer and to acquire those houses.

“I would ask that we seriously go back and engage with the developers in Ard na Gréine again and see if we can get these houses allocated to the families in Letterkenny who are driving up and down past them every day and seeing these finished houses.

“If we’re serious about addressing the housing problem, I think that’s what we need to be doing.”

In response, Mr John Gallagher, senior engineer with the council’s housing section, told Cllr McMonagle that he would come back to him on the programme, delivery and completion of Windyhall.