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Reuse radar

Dublin

Dublin City Council publishes a live map of its 147 derelict sites — 23 of them owned by the council itself — and the state's Land Development Agency maps public landholdings with their registered owners, so the owners of empty and underused property are unusually visible. Over 13,000 permitted homes sit on sites where nothing has started, and the council is now looking to sell or hand on the derelict houses it bought but could not afford to fix.
An empty building in Dublin with homes, balconies and neighbours drawn onto it in ink
Empty buildings on record
387
from 16 open sources
Vacant office space
597,700 m²
13.9% of the stock
Homes potential
≈ 1,630
if 30% of empty offices converted

Office figures: Colliers, Q2 2026 — 13.9% vacancy (12.2% excluding reserved space) applied to about 4.3 million m² of offices (Central Bank of Ireland from CBRE data, end-2024); vacant area = stock × rate, an estimate across two publishers and dates. Homes: our economic model’s conversion engine. Map built 2026-10-09.

In 3D, from today’s sources — a potential we spotted, not a plan.

Empty buildings in Dublin

One point per building, from public records, open data and cited reports. Filter by type, size and how sure the evidence is; open one to see who says so and whether it could become homes.

No open aerial imagery: Tailte Éireann orthophotos are licensed products and no open WMS covers the city, so building cards show Esri's World Imagery instead.

Loading map…
Colour = type of building named officially likely reported
Missing a building?

Check any building in Dublin: could it become homes, and could the EHC model work there?

4 more buildings in Dublin reported in the news, not yet on the map

The articles do not give an address we could place, so these have no pin yet. From news reports, summed up in our own words with a link to each article — not checked on site by EHC.

  • Distillers Building — reported empty · formerly office · owner: Office of Public WorksThe building was unoccupied while awaiting fit-out before tenants could move in Irish Examiner (2025-09-30)
  • Former Transylvania Restaurant warehouse, Laneway off North King Street, Dublin 7 — reported empty · formerly industrial building · owner: Health Service ExecutiveProtected two-storey 1810 warehouse, later a restaurant, standing vacant; the HSE bought it and planned an application in 2025. Dublin Inquirer (2024-06-19)
  • Latchford’s Hotel, Baggot Street — reported empty · formerly hotel · owner: Peter McVerry TrustThe former hotel was purchased in 2022 and has remained vacant since Irish Examiner (2025-06-19)
  • Liffey Street buildings, Liffey Street — reported for sale or to let · owner: Dublin City CouncilThe city council plans to sell empty buildings on Liffey Street that had been assessed for social housing. The Irish Times (2024-09-16)

Where conversion makes sense, and who to talk to

The districts where empty space, the right zoning and a working neighbourhood come together, and the owners and programmes that open a door. 597,700 m² of offices stand empty (13.9% of the stock).

A hand outlining a neighbourhood on a city map, with small houses drawn inside

The Liberties and Dublin 8

The most derelict sites of any postal district and the highest commercial vacancy in the city, next to the two big LDA projects that keep and reuse old buildings.

  • 31 of the 147 derelict sites are in Dublin 8
  • Commercial vacancy 17.6% in Q2 2026, the highest in Dublin
  • Donore (542 homes, 389 cost rental) under construction; Pear Tree Crossing planned for over 550 homes

Risk: Many entries are single houses and small infill plots; protected structures make conversion slower and dearer.

3 sources

North inner city (Dublin 1)

Georgian streets with empty upper floors and council-owned derelict buildings, inside the city-centre zone where the land tax now bites.

  • 20 derelict sites, including the council-owned protected structure at 30 Frederick Street North
  • 16 permissions since 2022 to turn shops, offices or storage into homes
  • 66 city-centre (Z5) parcels on the 2026 land-tax map

Risk: Fragmented ownership and protected structures; social problems around some streets slow sales.

3 sources

Phibsborough, Broadstone and Grangegorman (Dublin 7)

Derelict terraces the council owns and large state land at Broadstone the LDA has already assessed for housing.

  • 15 derelict sites, two of them council-owned houses on Connaught Street
  • CIE land at Broadstone assessed for 1,230–1,660 homes

Risk: The Broadstone depot is operational and rated a long-term (Class 3) site.

3 sources

Georgian core, Dublin 2 and 4

Most office-to-homes conversions in the city happen here, floor by floor in Georgian houses, as older offices lose tenants.

  • 67 permissions since 2022 to convert offices or shops to homes (44 in Dublin 2, 23 in Dublin 4)
  • Dublin 2 commercial vacancy 14.1% in Q2 2026, down 4.3 points

Risk: Highest land values in the city; buildings are small and usually protected, so each conversion yields only a few flats.

2 sources

Signals to watch

Decisions, auctions and closures that change what becomes available, and when.

  1. 2026-10-07More than 1,000 derelict cases open

    Dublin City Council's own grid of active derelict-site cases counts 1,027 open cases — seven times the 147 sites on the register — with the most (67 in one square kilometre) in the north inner city around Parnell Street and Gardiner Street.

    1 source
  2. 2026-09-30Derelict Sites Register updated

    147 active entries; 15 sites were added in August and September 2026 alone.

    2 sources
  3. 2026-09-07The State lists its 64 surplus empty properties

    In written answers the OPW published its list of 64 surplus vacant buildings and sites with status, year last used and 2025 holding costs; five are in Dublin city, among them 10–11 Castle Street (empty since 1999) and the former Debtors' Prison (since 2006). Separately, 21 homes in the Phoenix Park stand unoccupied.

    2 sources
5 earlier signals
  1. 2026-08-26
    Commercial vacancy down to 13.3%

    Dublin 8 highest at 17.6%; Dublin 2 fell 4.3 points to 14.1%.

    1 source
  2. 2026-07-14
    Office vacancy 13.9%

    Colliers: take-up up 57% on the quarter; vacancy excluding reserved space 12.2%.

    1 source
  3. 2026-06-25
    Irish Glass Bottle application

    1,510 more apartments proposed at Poolbeg West on top of 1,470 permitted.

    1 source
  4. 2026-05-11
    Council to sell derelict houses it bought

    Of 112 homes bought under Buy and Renew since 2017, 77 were refurbished and 32 remain vacant; some will be sold.

    1 source
  5. 2025-10-22
    Council pauses compulsory purchases of derelict homes

    Funding redirected to larger schemes; a disposal framework puts the LDA and housing charities first in line for council-owned derelict property.

    1 source

Sources, and what we cannot see

25 sources connected, 1 waiting for access. We only use data we may lawfully reuse; where a publisher blocks automated access we do not work around it — a person downloads it, or we ask for permission.

Every source, its licence and when we last read it
SourceAccessRecordsStatusLicence
OpenStreetMap disused/abandoned tags and brownfields
OpenStreetMap contributors
Open API344Live
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
Rail, S-Bahn and U-Bahn stations (OpenStreetMap)
OpenStreetMap contributors
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
Building heights: GlobalBuildingAtlas (TU Munich)
Zhu, X. X., Chen, S., Zhang, F., Shi, Y., Wang, Y. (2025), Technical University of Munich
GlobalBuildingAtlas: an open global and complete dataset of building polygons, heights and LoD1 3D models. Earth System Science Data 17(12), 6647–6668, doi:10.5194/essd-17-6647-2025. Read from the Parquet copy on Source Cooperative. Satellite-derived heights (typically 1.5–3 m error in Europe), turned into storeys with storey heights fitted on Berlin; used only where no register or official 3D model sizes the building.
Open download143 buildings sizedLive
2026-10-09
CC BY-NC 4.0 (heights); footprints from OpenStreetMap and Microsoft: ODbL
Storeys where the Global Building Atlas has a gap: EUBUCCO v0.2
EUBUCCO (TU Berlin / ai4up)
EUBUCCO v0.2, ODbL 1.0. Used only for buildings nothing else sizes — mainly central Dublin, where the Global Building Atlas has no buildings. Storeys mapped in OpenStreetMap, else EUBUCCO’s own estimate.
Open download194 buildings sizedLive
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0
Road noise (EU Environmental Noise Directive, Lden)
European Environment Agency
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
EEA standard re-use policy (attribution)
Leerstandsmelder.de — public reports of empty buildings
Leerstandsmelder (Gängeviertel e.V., Hamburg)
Shown while we ask Leerstandsmelder for permission. Reports since 2016 only, with the address, the month reported and a link to each entry; not checked by EHC. Each point says when a report has since been marked demolished, lived in, in interim use or rebuilt on Leerstandsmelder, and the owner type the reporter gave (private owners are never named).
Asking for permission0Pending
2026-10-09
Credited to Leerstandsmelder.de; asking for permission
Open-ended property funds: buildings they report partly empty
Open-ended real-estate funds (each point names its fund and report)
German and Austrian open-ended public property funds must list every property with its vacancy (or letting) rate in their annual and half-year reports. scripts/reuse/import-fund-reports.ts reads those lists; properties at 10 % vacancy or more are shown, those at 25 % or more count as evidence.
Open download0Live
2026-10-09
Published fund report (KAGB / KARBV property list), cited per point
Co-working spaces, department stores, banks, hotels and cinemas listed as permanently closed
Overture Maps Foundation (closure data: BrightQuery company records)
Places with operating_status "permanently_closed" in the monthly Overture release, read by scripts/reuse/import-overture-closures.ts and matched to the building they sit in. A closed business is usually one unit; names are shown only for companies, never for sole traders.
Open download0Live
2026-10-09
CDLA Permissive 2.0 (Overture Maps Foundation)
Land without current use and stalled construction, mapped from satellite imagery (Copernicus Urban Atlas 2006–2018)
European Environment Agency — Copernicus Land Monitoring Service
Urban Atlas class 13400 (brownfields, demolition sites and gaps in the built-up area, 0.25 ha and up) compared across the 2006, 2012 and 2018 editions, so each plot says how long it has stood unused; plus construction sites (13300) already under way in 2012, and 2012 construction sites left unused by 2018. Read from the EEA's open ArcGIS services, the same way in every radar city. The 2021 edition (Copernicus Data Space) drops plots built on since 2018 where scripts/reuse/import-urban-atlas-2021.ts has been run. Points are context, never evidence of vacancy.
Open API97Live
2026-10-09
Copernicus open data (© European Union, Copernicus Land Monitoring Service 2006–2021, EEA)
Office buildings of 1,000 m² or more, with depth and storeys (EUBUCCO)
EUBUCCO (TU Berlin / ai4up), from the Spanish cadastre, Regione Lombardia’s building database and OpenStreetMap
EUBUCCO harmonises Europe's building footprints with their use, height and age. Only buildings whose source names the use are kept — the cadastre's office class in Barcelona and Madrid, Lombardy's "commerciale" in Milan, building=office in OpenStreetMap for Dublin and Lisbon — never EUBUCCO's machine-learning guesses. The footprint gives the plan depth, so the conversion score treats them like the German cadastre's offices (scripts/reuse/import-eubucco.ts → src/scripts/data/reuse/eubucco/, ODbL).
Open download621Live
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (EUBUCCO v0.2; Dirección General del Catastro, Regione Lombardia, © OpenStreetMap contributors)
Stalled construction and buildings held by insolvent developers
EHC research (dated press and court sources per point)
Signa, Adler/Consus and other developer insolvencies since 2022 and stalled sites, each with its latest dated status (src/scripts/data/reuse/stalled-projects.json; news leads from scripts/reuse/mine-news.ts are reviewed before they join).
EHC research4Live
2026-10-09
Cited publisher per point
Church buildings the dioceses and regional churches plan to give up
Catholic dioceses and Protestant regional churches (their building plans), via EHC research
Buildings a church body’s published building plan or recent reporting names as to be given up, without church funding, for sale or lease, or profaned (src/scripts/data/reuse/church-plans.json and brussels-churches.json).
EHC research0Live
2026-10-09
Cited publisher per point
Named buildings and sites from EHC research (each with its own source)
European Housing Coop research
Includes the library’s public lighthouse conversions (src/scripts/data/reuse/lighthouses.json), shown under "Already converting" with a link to their library page.
EHC research17Live
2026-10-09
Facts cited to their publishers
Year built and listing: OpenStreetMap building tags
OpenStreetMap contributors
start_date / construction_date and heritage / listed_status of the OpenStreetMap outline a record is matched to, where no register answers. Read with the outline match, not a separate query.
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0 (© OpenStreetMap contributors)
Derelict Sites Register (privately owned sites)
Dublin City Council — Derelict Sites Section
Open API124Live
2026-10-09
Dublin City Council; reuse with acknowledgement of DCC as the source (terms on the ArcGIS item); informational copy of the statutory register
Derelict Sites Register — sites owned by Dublin City Council
Dublin City Council — Derelict Sites Section
Open API23Live
2026-10-09
Dublin City Council; reuse with acknowledgement of DCC as the source (terms on the ArcGIS item); informational copy of the statutory register
Planning permissions: change of use to homes (since 2022)
Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage — National Planning Application Database (Dublin City Council register)
Open API127Live
2026-10-09
CC BY 4.0
Residential Zoned Land Tax map 2026 — central, mixed-use, regeneration and institutional land
Dublin City Council / Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage
Open API179Live
2026-10-09
CC BY 4.0 (Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage)
Register of Relevant Public Land (non-green-space public landholdings)
Land Development Agency
Open API945Live
2026-10-09
CC BY 4.0 (LDA); folio boundaries derived from Property Registration Authority data, PRA copyright
Report on Relevant Public Land — state sites assessed for housing
Land Development Agency
Open API33Live
2026-10-09
No licence stated — shown with credit to Land Development Agency (EHC decision, 6 Oct 2026)
Permitted homes not started (Dublin Housing Supply Task Force, Q1 2025)
Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage — Housing Supply Coordination Task Force for Dublin
Open API113Used, not shown
2026-10-09
CC BY 4.0 (series published on data.gov.ie)
OpenStreetMap: land mapped as brownfield
OpenStreetMap contributors
Open API98Live
2026-10-09
ODbL 1.0
Homes permitted but not started (housing supply pipeline, Q2 2026)
Department of Housing — 4Dublin Housing Supply Pipeline (Dublin City Council area)
Open API136Live
2026-10-09
No licence stated — shown with credit to the Department of Housing (EHC decision, 6 Oct 2026)
Buildings named in the news (each with its article)
Local and national press, read by EHC
Buildings the news reports empty, for sale or to let, to be demolished or being converted (src/scripts/data/reuse/news-building-leads.json; rules in src/lib/reuse/news-layer.ts). A report that names a building already on the map is shown on its card instead of a second point; one an open source contradicted, or that says the building is in use, is left out. Not checked on site.
EHC research53Live
2026-10-14
Facts with a link to the article; the one-line summary is ours — no article text is republished
Era of the buildings around it: CSO census 2022 (Small Areas)
Central Statistics Office (CSO); boundaries Tailte Éireann
Occupied households by period built (SAPS T6_2) in the record’s Small Area — homes, not the building itself.
Open downloadscoringLive
2026-10-14
CC BY 4.0
Probable era: estimated from a street photo (Panoramax, Mapillary, Google Street View)
Panoramax and Mapillary contributors; Google Street View (research use agreed with Google, 14 Oct 2026); estimate by EHC with a vision model
Where no register dates a building: its era read from a Panoramax or Mapillary photo looking at it — Google Street View only where no open photo answers (scripts/reuse/estimate-photo-eras.ts), only when the building is clearly visible and the model is confident, and only as “before 1945” or “1945 or later” — the split it got right for 89% of buildings with a register year in Amsterdam and Paris, and 89% from Street View pictures alone (photo-eras/calibration.json). An estimate: a sentence in the conversion check, never points.
Open APIscoringLive
2026-10-14
Open photos CC BY-SA 4.0 or Licence Ouverte 2.0 (per picture); Street View read for research only, never stored or shown; only the estimated era is published, never a photo

What this radar cannot see yet

  • No open aerial imagery: Tailte Éireann orthophotos are licensed products and no open WMS covers the city, so building cards show Esri's World Imagery instead.
  • Office vacancy is published only as headline rates by brokers; GeoDirectory's address-level vacancy data is a paid product.
  • There is no address-level list of vacant homes: the Census gives counts by small area, the council's vacant-homes work is not published by address, and a September 2026 parliamentary question on the HSE's vacant buildings was passed to the HSE to answer the deputy directly, so the reply is not public.
  • The Vacant Sites Register ended when the Residential Zoned Land Tax replaced the vacant site levy; the tax map shows land, not empty buildings.
  • Conversions that count as exempted development (such as vacant above-shop space) need no permission and do not appear in the planning data.
  • Derelict-site cases still under investigation (1,027 in October 2026) are published only as counts per square kilometre, not by address; only the 147 sites on the statutory register are on this map.

Know an empty building we have missed?

Open data cannot see everything. Tell us about a building in Dublin that stands empty or barely used; once we have checked it, it joins the map under “Reported by visitors (checked)”.

A phone held up to photograph an empty shopfront, with a map pin drawn above it

We publish the address, the kind of building and your description once we have checked it — never your email. Please do not name the people who own or live in a building.

Radars nearby

The other radars in the same country and the nearest beyond. All 149 cities in the atlas

The figure on each card: empty buildings on record.

Amsterdam, Netherlands69empty buildings on recordAntwerp, Belgium308empty buildings on recordBirmingham, United Kingdom148empty buildings on recordCork, Ireland415empty buildings on recordEdinburgh, United Kingdom138empty buildings on recordGhent, Belgium37empty buildings on recordGlasgow, United Kingdom176empty buildings on recordLille, France56empty buildings on recordLondon, United Kingdom1,282empty buildings on recordManchester, United Kingdom94empty buildings on recordRotterdam, Netherlands50empty buildings on recordThe Hague, Netherlands49empty buildings on record