Column: Push for apartment building in Kilkenny and nationally long overdue but better late than never

With the housing crisis well into its second decade, there’s no one solution to the complex myriad of problems stemming from years of negligent government policy, crippling lack of supply and external global factors.

However, the powers that be seem to finally be waking up to the potential of one aspect of relieving the pressures of the crisis, an increase in higher-rise, high density housing, both in Kilkenny and nationwide.

The aversion to high-rise apartments in Ireland can be traced back to previous failures of developments like the Ballymun flats in the 1960s and 70s, with many tarring all subsequent initiatives with the same brush rather than highlighting more prominent issues there such as overcrowding, poor maintenance and lack of government support.

This hostility has manifested itself in the present day with around only 10% of the Irish population living in apartments, the lowest in the EU, as opposed to the European average of 48%.

Times seem to finally be changing as in 2025, apartments accounted for one-third of all new homes, up from 16% in 2019 while year-on-year completions increased by almost 39%.

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An upsurge in apartment living can reduce the impact of urban sprawl, allow people to live closer to urban centres, provide a more viable option for young people to get on the property ladder and are generally cheaper than houses, though this is something which has yet to materialise as strongly in Ireland as other countries.

The most recent Budget showed a desire to incentivise apartment building with VAT on the sale of new units reduced from 13.5% to 9% along with reductions and exemptions in some cases on corporation tax involved in new builds.

Budget 2026 was criticised from many quarters as being filled with subsidies for developers over supports for renters and hopeful buyers, but whatever your opinion on the Government’s preference for private sector solutions to the housing crisis, the incentives to increase building at least show some awareness of the viability of apartment living.

Though much of the discussion is understandably focused on the capital, Kilkenny County Council has adapted its strategy to deal with changing demographics as well.

As people are forced to postpone milestones like marriage and starting a family until much later in life due the cost of living crisis, the traditional demand for three-bed semi-detached homes has dropped with it, leaving the deficit in one and two bed-units needing to be bridged.

In Kilkenny City, 86% of approved applicants on the housing list require one or two-bed dwellings with the previous lack of supply for these leaving some single people languishing on the list for upwards of a decade. 

The race to counteract this in local housing strategy saw the 55 social housing units delivered in the city last year consist of around 78% one and two-bed apartments or houses; but with only 12 one-beds delivered last year and 347 people on the waitlist for them, more needs to be done despite the promising changes made.

Poor quality builds like the aforementioned Ballymun flats and shoddily constructed Celtic Tiger cash grabs have led to apartment developments being more objected to than housing equivalents; and although the actual impact of NIMBYs on supply is a point of contention, the regular phrases of concerns about ‘the character of the area’ tend to raise their heads more often than usual.

The quality of builds needs to improve to contradict these ideas, something which has happened in Kilkenny according to Eimear Cody, Senior Engineer in the Council’s Housing Section.

“Even ten years ago, people kind of associated apartments with dodgy flats and lesser quality of accommodation but that’s changing,” she said.

“We had the Broguemaker apartments on the Castlecomer Road and there was a lot of concern around that. We actually got a lot of commentary afterwards that people were very happy with the quality of builds,” she added.

Though we’re many years away from being in a position where apartments are seen as a home for life, fit to raise a family in, like the culture of Spain, we can at least aim to get to a place where young people have an option to get a foothold in life without having to fork over most of their income to live in a semi-detached house with strangers.

Apartments aren’t yet the cost-effective, viable solution they should be, and despite the complex issues behind this, continuing the increase in their supply has to be the main priority for now.

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Article funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme