A Muslim community group has sought planning permission to build a mosque on a site in Lucan.
South Dublin Maktab, a voluntary charitable organisation which represents Muslims in the Lucan/Clondalkin area, is behind the proposed development on the site in Balgaddy.
The planning application, lodged with South Dublin County Council, seeks permission to build a three-storey mosque and large community centre incorporating solar PV panels and a feature minaret and dome, 2 classrooms and underground carpark at a site off the Lucan Newlands Road in Balgaddy.
The site, which was bought by the applicant in 2016, has been unoccupied for several years.
Currently the local Islamic community represented by South Dublin Maktab use the premises of the South Dublin Football League in Ballyowen Park.
The first Islamic place of worship in Lucan opened in 2000 in a place named Makki Masjid.
In 2003 all the activities of Makki Masjid were moved to a rented property in Grange Manor.
Since 2007 the South Dublin Football League hall has hosted local Islamic activities and in Ramadan 2014 the community gave their services at SDFL the name South Dublin Maktab (Lucan).
South Dublin Maktab say their purpose is “to cater for the religious, cultural and educational needs of the Muslim Community in particular and the local community in general and to provide a better understanding of religion through educational, spiritual, social, religious and cultural activities.”
According to the Census in 2016, 63,400 people out of our population of 4,761,865 declared their religion as Islam, with 3.7m declaring themselves Roman Catholic and 126,400 as Church of Ireland.
Islam is now the third largest religion in the country and according to the CSO one of the fastest growing religions in Ireland.
The headquarters of the foundation is at the Dublin Mosque and Islamic Centre on the South Circular Road which was the first mosque established in Ireland in 1976.
In Dublin the Clonskeagh mosque has around 5,000 members, the Islamic Centre in Blanchardstown has around 2,000 and the IFI has roughly the same.
