UCD is at the centre of a planning dispute, with neighbours furious that the university is attempting to impose a halting site in their area instead of at a site previously approved by the council.

The college has been accused of guarding its own commercial interests at the expense of residents, who are angry they now face two halting sites within 400 metres of each other.

However, according to UCD, the site in question was chosen 20 years ago and reaffirmed after an independent review.

The dispute centres around plans for a 'traveller, community' or 'social-need' site which the college had promised to provide at Roebuck Road, near the top of Foster Avenue in south Dublin.

"About five years ago, at the request of the council, UCD contracted an independent planner to consider all possible sites on the Belfield campus and the site on top of Foster Avenue was again considered to be the most appropriate for this purpose," the college said.

But according to local councillor Gearóid O'Keeffe, an official council motion passed in 2005 confirmed that the preferred site for such a halting site would be at the city boundary of Beech Hill.

He says members of the community are irate at UCD's insistence on providing land at Roebuck Road as this would mean there would be two halting sites within 400 metres of each other.

UCD has also been accused of refusing to accept the Beech Hill site because it is near a multimillion-euro development for which it is attempting to get planning permission. This entails a 50,000 square foot mixed-use development with over 200 residential units, offices and retail space filed under the names of Pamarette Ltd and UCD.

O'Keeffe is now demanding that the developers and the university "honour" their legal obligations to provide council accommodation on the same site and has also asked that planners review eight sites examined in the private consultants' report. He said this report was "flawed" as it did not take into account the close potential proximity of two halting sites.

"There would be nowhere else in the county where you would have two halting sites so closely located," he said. "My argument would be that if UCD want to build 200 units in Beech Hill let them provide their Part V obligations (for social and affordable housing) within the same development. But they don't want to do that because it will seriously devalue the development.

"They are showing contempt for the residents there. The residents are all going mad. The university has been very well supported by the local residents over the years and they are showing utter contempt by putting big business first and the residents second."