Una Mullally: Don’t laugh, but it’s obvious what should happen with Dublin’s O’Connell Street
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2023/07/03/una-mullally-dont-laugh-but-its-obvious-what-should-happen-with-dublins-oconnell-street/
I love this article and I’ve been saying this for years to anyone who’d listen. I’d start from scratch, remove all the gawky looking retail shops to side streets, create galleries and theatres and museums along the street with a few retail units that complement the street. This is our national st and it’s a Kip quite frankly, we need to take pride in it. Una writes a lot about the urban decay of our environs and I think it’s about time people listened.
We ought to be ashamed of ourselves to let our national street fall into such a decline.
All it takes is some imagination and joint up thinking and without a hint of irony we can Make O’Connell st, our Champs Elysee. A beautiful cultural hot bed, a place to be seen.
Something we can be proud off. As right now, who can be proud of O’Connell St ?
by EssdubU
25 comments
Leave Europe’s largest open air bus station alone
Start by getting rid of that stupid Spire,it’s ugly and shit
Be better off with Nelson’s column back there!
Fewer fast food chains, Carroll’s, open air soup kitchens (it’s a great initiative but shouldn’t be on the capital’s main street that already has enough issues with antisocial behaviour), and a more visible police presence and O’Connell Street would improve in no time.
I don’t think filling it full of things that people don’t actually use is a good idea either. It doesn’t solve the problem of it just being full of tourists and scumbags.
Moving the City Library from the Ilac to the now largely unused Ambassador Theatre would be an absolutely great idea.
Nah I’d say we should open up 15 more Carrolls gift shops
It’s not the shops and the fast food places that are the problem. The city has a massive problem with poverty, homelessness, drug addiction and anti-social behaviour. The north in we city is particularly bad. O’Connell St is just a reflection of that reality and of the fact that our government doesn’t take these problems seriously.
You can make all of the cosmetic changes you want to O’Connell St but it won’t change until we fix the underlying problem.
O’Connell St is perfect as it is. It represents our broken country and our unwillingness to tackle our problems.
A Low yield nuke, would be ideal
It’s shocking how Dublin is failing at lacking of revitalisation programmes regardless of who owns the buildings in the most representative of city centre areas. Revitalisation programmes like it happens in the rest of Europe pushing the ideas like side streets, creating galleries etc. Streets throughout the urban city plans are creating possibilities for those mentioned functions, but also assign actors to execute those functions correctly, stopping at the same time complete mess that city centre can create.
Start removing all the scrotes from there
It all turned to shite when they changed the name. Bring back Sackville St
This is ireland we’re talking about. Any changes to anything will take a decade or longer.
In what way is O’Connell St. our “national street” that Grafton Street isn’t?
Genuine question.
I like how theres a gaping wound of missing buildings that hasnt been filled in like 15 years.
Is there any other city that enforces an “Aesthetic” law on business in key locations? I don’t mind if there’s a McDonald’s on the street or a Newsagent so long as they actually maintain their appearance and would be heavily encouraged to fit an aesthetic in keeping with the appearance of the city. Fines for not picking up litter outside their “section” of the street or having delipadated signage, that sort of thing.
Just don’t touch Beshoff’s.
Would have called Grafton the national street, I take visiting family and friends to Grafton and never O’Connell
She’s right to diagnose the real problem. It’s not “scrotes”, it’s not drugs, it’s not lack of funding. It’s a lack of vision.
For the first time in ages I had overseas guests staying and, walking around the city I was so acutely aware of what a kip it is. It was really embarrassing. Dublin was always a bit “edgy” (to be diplomatic) but it always had a certain charm. But now it’s just filthy and scary.
As someone said it’s a basically a bus terminal, what would ppl do with “galleries and theatres and museums ” when you are coming off a bus and trying to get a connecting bus. Soft gentrification nonsense.
How about instead of all this, we accept it’s a lost cause and just move the national street somewhere else.
We could have a big street like this in some mad place like dundrum and call it a day. Leave o connell street to fall asunder.
Ban casinos from O Connell street. They do not attract the right sort of tourist.
The problems of O’Connell st are easily avoided by living on the Southside and never crossing over. /s
Come up with all the ideas you want but at the end of the say the lobby groups like the Irish Council for Criminal Liberties will object to anything that makes the lives of Junkies and Muggers slightly more uncomfortable.
Trees and benches would be a great start