Poolbeg chimneys to be knocked down?

Dave! · 11-07-2014 7:41am #1

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/environment/famous-poolbeg-chimneys-face-being-knocked-down-1.1862406

The ESB has warned it may not “be possible at all” to leave the famous Poolbeg chimneys in Dublin standing, and will decide by the end of the year whether to knock them down.

ESB chief executive Pat O’Doherty said carrying out the structural and repair works needed to keep the 680ft high twin stacks may not be the best use of resources.

The old power station in Poolbeg ceased operation in 2010 and, in a letter to Minister for Tourism Leo Varadkar, Mr O’Doherty said a review of the site, currently under way, will be completed by the end of the year.

What do ye reckon?

Would be horrific IMO

Hootanany · 11-07-2014 7:43am

They are only Chimneys no loss.

Dartz · 11-07-2014 7:44am

I like them.

They're a landmark. Shame to see them go.

SweetChaos · 11-07-2014 7:47am

I would not like to see them go they are a instantly recognizable part of Dublin

stampydmonkey · 11-07-2014 7:49am

Dartz wrote: »

I like them.

They're a landmark. Shame to see them go.

Just throw up 2 more red and white spires.

They would be missed from the skyline alright.

Luke92 · 11-07-2014 7:51am

They really are a Dublin landmark. They're usually how I know I'm over Dublin when in a plane.

Zulu · 11-07-2014 7:54am

A bloke in the pub once told me that, with 'special permission', one could get granted access to the tippy top. Most probably bs, unless by 'special' he meant employed to maintain them.

Eitherway it was always kinda on my bucket list. While I'm terrified of heights, just imagine the views from up there!

IRLConor · 11-07-2014 7:54am

Dartz wrote: »

They're a landmark.

SweetChaos wrote: »

I would not like to see them go they are a instantly recognizable part of Dublin

The gasometer on Sir John Rogerson's Quay was also a instantly recognisable landmark in its day, but lots of people don't even remember it now.

For better or worse, landmarks come and go.

Luke92 · 11-07-2014 7:57am

Zulu wrote: »

While I'm terrified of heights, just imagine the views from up there!

I'm the same with heights, but yeah the views would be absolutely amazing! Be like the Hurakan Condor tower in Portaventura. Amazing views across Salou!

bnt · 11-07-2014 8:06am

This isn't London, and that's not the Battersea Power Station. I say remove them and build something better in their place, like a 300m tall statue of my middle finger.

imitation · 11-07-2014 8:06am

While they are a recognizable land mark for the Irish, I dont think its worth spending a lot of public money keeping two defuct industrial chimney standing forever more. I can't see them being much of a tourist draw either, they probably belong more in an Al Gore video than a failte Ireland one.

jacksie66 · 11-07-2014 8:12am

This post has been deleted.

Peregrine · 11-07-2014 8:22am

I remember talking walks along the Royal Canal and seeing Croke Park with the chimneys beside them at a distance. I know they're just chimneys but that view was really nice, especially at dusk. It's also a part of most views of Dublin Bay. No, tourists may not even be interested in it but it's still a landmark.

If it doesn't cost too much to keep them, then we should. If it's too large of a sum, I'd definitely be sad to see them go.

SEPT 23 1989 · 11-07-2014 8:40am

Great Pyramid of Giza
Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Statue of Zeus at Olympia
Poolbeg Chimneys
Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
Colossus of Rhodes
Lighthouse of Alexandria

we can hardly have six wonders of the world now can we?

leave them alone

LizzieJones · 11-07-2014 8:47am

They look like a bloody eyesore. Sorry folks but they do.

SEPT 23 1989 · 11-07-2014 8:48am

LizzieJones wrote: »

They look like a bloody eyesore. Sorry folks but they do.

you can see them all the way from Canada?

what a true marvel they are

comongethappy · 11-07-2014 8:56am

I had no idea poolbeg wasn't generating power?

Where does Dublin get its electricity?

vicwatson · 11-07-2014 8:58am

LizzieJones wrote: »

They look like a bloody eyesore. Sorry folks but they do.

Well close your eyes:)

ectoraige · 11-07-2014 8:58am

Change resistance is a pretty natural reaction to anything like this, the thing to ask yourself is would you do it in reverse? If they didn't exist, and somebody proposed building two giant red and white chimneys for no reason than to add to the Dublin skyline, would you be in favour?

Having said that, I will miss them if they go, they were the only landmark I could see from my bedroom window growing up in a nondescript Dublin suburb, and I've always looked out for them the times I've been on a ferry back to Dublin.

AudreyHepburn · 11-07-2014 8:58am

I'm torn on this one tbh.

They are a major landmark for the city, but they are also a serious eyesore.

vicwatson · 11-07-2014 8:58am

comongethappy wrote: »

I had no idea poolbeg wasn't generating power?

Where does Dublin get its electricity?

From the sun

BeerWolf · 11-07-2014 8:59am

Very familiar landmark to many, but Christ is it ugly as sin...

Peregrine · 11-07-2014 9:00am

LizzieJones wrote: »

They look like a bloody eyesore. Sorry folks but they do.

Did you just look up images of 'Poolbeg chimneys'?

Noo, you gotta see them from the Lighthouse or Dollymount Strand. The bay just won't look the same without them. It's not beautiful, no, but it's a landmark.

diomed · 11-07-2014 9:06am

We want to avoid a second twin towers catastrophe. The nordies might try to spoil our glorious centenary celebration of 1916.

miss no stars · 11-07-2014 9:10am

I think what gets missed is that not all parts of a city must be pretty. They aren't pretty, but neither are they ugly. However, they certainly are dublin. They are the single most distinctive feature of dublin bay. When you tear stuff down because someone declares it ugly and an eyesore, and you replace it with pretty glass and steel, yeah, you get rid of some grittyness. But it's a city with history, it's supposed to be gritty in parts. When you take away all that is old and gritty (and often definitive of the city) and replace it with new and shiney, you gradually tear the soul out of the place. Look at the docklands, you could be ANYWHERE. But the towers are distinctly Dublin. I hope they don't go. Hopefully the letter is just trying to hit the state up for some cash for repairs.

Santa Cruz · 11-07-2014 9:19am

Knock them down and extend the incinerator and The John Gormley Memorial Sewage Plant

Teyla Emmagan · 11-07-2014 9:21am

I am fond of them, but I don't think it's worth throwing money at them to keep them. They're not exactly Christ the Redeamer.

dub_skav · 11-07-2014 9:24am

It would be an awful shame to see them go. Somebody already mentioned the Gasometer, I think that was a great loss to the history and fabric of the city.
I have very old memories as a young child of the chimneys and see them as intrinsically Dublin.
I would be interested to see what the actual cost is, we spend a lot of money on stupid and pointless stuff we should be able to examine the possibility of spending to keep an actual landmark..

The years have made me bitter, the gargle dims my brain
'Cause Dublin keeps on changing & nothing stays the same
The Pillar & the Met have gone, the Royal long since pulled down
As the grey unyielding concrete makes a city of my town

sjb25 · 11-07-2014 9:25am

Knock em down replace with a giant statue of our holy lord mr garth brooks

hmmm · 11-07-2014 9:29am

Sure they're recognisable, but you could say the same about Chernobyl or Garth Brooks, and we'd still like to get rid of them.

Zen65 · 11-07-2014 9:38am

comongethappy wrote: »

I had no idea poolbeg wasn't generating power?

Where does Dublin get its electricity?

From any generator connected to the grid, anywhere in Ireland (or the UK since we now have interconnectors). There are other large generators operating in Dublin, the biggest being in Huntstown and another in Ringsend. There is also some generation in Poolbeg still (the smaller four chimneys east of the big ones).

The truth is we don't need generators in Dublin though it's generally more efficient to generate locally to where you consume.

Personally I think the chimneys could be replaced with a couple of large wind turbines, to show how environmentally aware we have become.

mobby · 11-07-2014 9:44am

No way they should be knocked, they are part of the Dublin skyline.
A little bit of imagination for that area is all that's required.

deandean · 11-07-2014 9:46am

Knock them down quick, before somebody declares they are national monument and then it'll cost taxpayers 1 million Euro year to maintain the flipping things.

Just keep their image on the flight simulator programs, it is great craic flying your Learjet between the two chimneys.

As for knocking them down, you wouldn't be able to blow them up because there are too many buildings close by. You would have to do it the hard way :eek:

https://us.v-cdn.net/6034073/uploads/attachments/328127/314177.jpg

Duggy747 · 11-07-2014 9:47am

Turn them into 2 giant syringes.

Maphisto · 11-07-2014 9:48am

comongethappy wrote: »

I had no idea poolbeg wasn't generating power?

Where does Dublin get its electricity?

They harvest all the hot air from $hoite spoken

Zulu · 11-07-2014 9:55am

I'd love to see the government turning them into a tourist site. Buy them, build an observation deck on the top, with a lift up. Could have a simple deck on one and then in a few year, if it was turning a profit, build a revolving restaurant on the other?

...but that would involve forward thinking, and considering it would be a public company - spiraling prohibitive costs. ...spending 5 years in planning and political doldrums, until it's made a private/public enterprise where the government pay a some of their cozy friends in the private sector to come in and run the project keeping all profits forever, and having any losses insured at tax payers expense.

Scratch that. We simply can't have nice things can we.

c_man · 11-07-2014 10:01am

Do people like them that much? Special breed there, remember when they were claiming that Liberty Hall was a national treasure :eek:

aloyisious · 11-07-2014 10:01am

I'm surprised by the fact that they are only 40 years old (built in the 70's), can't recall seeing/hearing anything about them being built while I lived in Dublin back then. Retain them, they are the only architectural item of size/stature down that part of Dublin, it's version of that statue outside NYC.

comongethappy · 11-07-2014 10:15am

mobby wrote: »

No way they should be knocked, they are part of the Dublin skyline.
A little bit of imagination for that area is all that's required.

Quality should trump nostalgia.

muddypaws · 11-07-2014 10:22am

Zulu wrote: »

A bloke in the pub once told me that, with 'special permission', one could get granted access to the tippy top. Most probably bs, unless by 'special' he meant employed to maintain them.

Eitherway it was always kinda on my bucket list. While I'm terrified of heights, just imagine the views from up there!

Zulu wrote: »

I'd love to see the government turning them into a tourist site. Buy them, build an observation deck on the top, with a lift up. Could have a simple deck on one and then in a few year, if it was turning a profit, build a revolving restaurant on the other?

...but that would involve forward thinking, and considering it would be a public company - spiraling prohibitive costs. ...spending 5 years in planning and political doldrums, until it's made a private/public enterprise where the government pay a some of their cozy friends in the private sector to come in and run the project keeping all profits forever, and having any losses insured at tax payers expense.

Scratch that. We simply can't have nice things can we.

Exactly this, I've never been close to them, so don't know how big they are, and whether it would be feasible, but this would be great.

I love seeing them, I was born in Dublin but grew up in England, would come home every summer on the ferry, so I guess they mean a lot to me, I still go over to England regularly, and always look out for them as we come into Dublin.

Pepe LeFrits · 11-07-2014 10:27am

Yeah, let's get rid of the chimneys and replace them with some more five storey buildings. That'll be exciting to look at. I say keep the chimneys. Dublin's skyline is monotonous enough as it is.

c_man wrote: »

Do people like them that much? Special breed there, remember when they were claiming that Liberty Hall was a national treasure :eek:

Liberty Hall would be grand if it was transparent the way it was designed to be.

The Backwards Man · 11-07-2014 10:29am

Put a couple of wind turbines up in their place.

Cienciano · 11-07-2014 10:32am

Zulu wrote: »

I'd love to see the government turning them into a tourist site. Buy them, build an observation deck on the top, with a lift up. Could have a simple deck on one and then in a few year, if it was turning a profit, build a revolving restaurant on the other?

...but that would involve forward thinking, and considering it would be a public company - spiraling prohibitive costs. ...spending 5 years in planning and political doldrums, until it's made a private/public enterprise where the government pay a some of their cozy friends in the private sector to come in and run the project keeping all profits forever, and having any losses insured at tax payers expense.

Scratch that. We simply can't have nice things can we.

I think because of the location it just wouldn't make money. Would be cool to have an viewing point there though.

riffmongous · 11-07-2014 10:35am

Isn't there a Dublin forum on Boards?

Zulu · 11-07-2014 10:41am

Cienciano wrote: »

I think because of the location it just wouldn't make money. Would be cool to have an viewing point there though.

You'd think that, but the tourist would go for the view. People head up to the guinness for the view - and thats out of the bloody way.

Xcellor · 11-07-2014 10:46am

They are two chimney stacks from an old power plant? I'd expect most people to be happy to see them go.

Drop the Ball · 11-07-2014 10:58am

Recognisable Landmark…Yes.
Aesthetic value…None

Blow them up or known them down IMO. Do in a dramatic fashion and turn it into a big even/day-out for the city.

Badly Drunk Boy · 11-07-2014 12:04pm

Zen65 wrote: »

Personally I think the chimneys could be replaced with a couple of large wind turbines, to show how environmentally aware we have become.

I was just about to suggest this. Put up 2 red and white wind turbines which will be an instantly recognisable landmark, an eyesore, and also generate electricity.

Everybody wins!!

Nemeses · 11-07-2014 1:02pm

I think they have served their purpose.

I mean, Ireland is paying a fair bit already with this debt nonsense.

Sell them to the Germans.. Germans love brick.

No wait... The Danish do. Send it to them!

Super-Rush · 11-07-2014 1:17pm

On one hand I couldn't care less because i don't live in Dublin.

On the other hand I couldn't give a **** what goes on in Dublin.

the_monkey · 11-07-2014 1:22pm

Yes, I would go along and get some good action shots!!

Poolbeg chimneys to be knocked down?

Should the Poolbeg chimneys be demolished? 472 votes

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