An Bord Pleanála told the government they had “significantly under-estimated” just how much work would be involved in dealing with applications under the controversial Strategic Housing Application process.
The planning board said they had assigned just six inspectors to the process at first, but that this had more than doubled under the weight of work required.
It said they now needed sixteen extra staff to manage their workload in a submission to the Department of Public Expenditure-led review of the National Development Plan.
An Bord Pleanála said a major increase in manpower would be needed to deal with the “predicted surge in applications and the increased complexity of cases that come before us”.
On Strategic Housing Development (SHD), they said they expected a significant rise in pre-application requests and applications over the next twelve to eighteen months.