The local primary school, Scoil Mhuire ar Cnoc na hAoine (St. Mary's on the Hill), was granted extensions to cope with over-populated classrooms.

Scoil Mhic Shuibhne (now Terence McSwiney Community College) was opened in 1979, the first VEC (Vocational Educational Committee) mixed school.

Like other local schools, enrollment has dropped and stabilized at under half that number, mainly due to changing demographics of an aging population and the Celtic tiger – an economic boom in Ireland from the mid-1990s to mid-2000s fueled by foreign investment – which enabled many families to relocate and purchase homes in newer estates in the Cork county region.

However Cork City Council have made efforts to improve this situation and development is now visible with a new Town Centre under construction on Harbour View Road.

[citation needed] There was also some questioning of the City Council's relationship with Apple Inc., which planned expansion of their headquarters for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and wanted a new road built where houses stood.

Concerns increased with Apple's subsequent plans to buy land that include part of an old pilgrimage route and a newer section of a main road circling the outside of the neighbourhood.

In the late 1970s and 1980s, there was a nursery school operating in Ardmore Avenue, but for various reasons (including lack of a teacher, building unsuitability and lower child population numbers) it had closed.

[8] Described in the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage as a "striking landmark visible from several points around the city", Knocknaheeny's water tower is a prominent feature in the area.