Has Galway missed the boat?

galvianlord

I know we have threads on the recession and while related the question I ask in this thread is a bit different.

The economic boom has now come to an end, the tiger is dead yada yada yada....many cities and towns in Ireland have changed for the better in terms of infrastructure and regeneration and urban renewal, their local authorities were willing to grasp the nettle and dance with the devil and at the end of things ended up better places (there maybe some exceptions but not all development over the past 10 years was necessarily bad, think Ballymun etc). There would seem to be a solid base for may of them to weather the recession.

But when you turn to Galway and in particular the city centre what has changed? Pedestrianised streets, a shambolic Eyre Square development, a water crisis, a contentious city hall and crochety councillors who are at each others necks all the time (the officials arent much better). Fine there's a museum, but that appears to be a bit of a white elephant. Not much else from a cultural point of view particularly for a city that once expected to be European Capital of Culture but could barely rustle up 1000 seats in several differnet theatres. Shop st and Quay St and William St dont have too much going for them (refer to every thread bemoaning trying to buy clothes on this board) except for phone shops and pubs and closed premises. No bypass and a bridge to nowhere...

I guess things were earmarked for the train station but god only knows if that will happen now there's no money about. We still have oil tanks in the docks with something like 12 weeks to go to a sporting event that will expose Galway to a wider audience than ever before. Nothing moves and if it moves, its objected to! Who's to blame, the Council, the Councillors, An Taisce, Businesses, Us? It reminds me of a great poem about Galway written in the 1840s, where people in Galway live on their memories and history and put things off for another day....so any thoughts....it just irks me that this is all there to the town, a stage set for festivals and socialising but little else - ref: the excitment over the opening of Burger King!!!!?

So what's the story have we missed the boat?

We'll have a big road to Dublin, and a train to Gort. That and a lot of sprawl in the suburbs and one off housing in the county and the traffic and poor ground water quality that goes with it.

While the city centre has improved a lot compared to the early 90 there were a lot of missed opportunities over the past 15 years.

Webbs

To follow on from your post - you dont give any examples of what it is you would like to see in the town, and I use that term deliberately as a population under a 100k to me is a town regardless of its title.
Maybe give suggestions and then people can comment.

For me what is really missing is a few decent arts venues, as you mention Galway rightly prides itself on its arts heritage, but there should be a large venue capable of holding music/theatre/exhibitions that could hold upto say 3000 people in a flexible space with coffee shop, bar etc that would mena the building is used all year round (the idea of one was proposed for fisheries field, has anything come of this?). The arts cinema planned is well overdo and if they convert the old instore shop to an arts space as well then that would mean Galway would have a great environment for the arts.

Webbs

Webbs wrote: »

but there should be a large venue capable of holding music/theatre/exhibitions that could hold upto say 3000 people in a flexible space with coffee shop, bar etc that would mean the building is used all year round (the idea of one was proposed for fisheries field, has anything come of this?).

I always thought somewhere like merchant's road would have been suitable for this before they developed it but it is too late now.

galvianlord

Ok as to suggestions, I wanted to throw a few random comments out to see what people came up with, it's centred around the arts so far...so,

Well if that's the case should the town be making a more concerted effort with regard to the arts? The fisheries field plan was brought up by NUIG, who own the land and proposed the construction of a dedicated concert hall. Due to cutbacks on education it is now unlikely that that will see the light of day over the next ten years, I maybe wrong. The plan for the Art Cinema has been ongoing for several years now, the group behind it were meant to go into some building in Dominick Street at one point, then out to the Eye and now we have a commitment from the Council to build a purpose built facility on the corner opposite the City Museum. From what I have been reading the Council is now under severe financial pressure at the moment so you'd have to ask if that will now be built? The same goes for the old McDonough place on Merchant's Road, where are they going to get the cash to buy that place? All of this could be done much earlier if people had got off the bandwagon to do something about it, but now it would seem to be a missed opportunity.

If Galway was to focus on the Arts as its future then it might well have positive spin-off for the wider city, although its effect on levels of employment would be negligible - how many full-time jobs would be created in an Art Cinema or a Gallery? When you think about it would be the ideal place for more large-scale creative industries to set up base as they would thrive in a creative environment. Unlikely to happen over the short or medium term though...

also found this link through a recent news story, anyone no any more about it?

http://www.2020visionforgalway.com/welcome.html

ScumLord

The only thing that really annoys me is the roads. There poorly made and had absolutely no thought put into them. It's hard to see how anyone could accidental let the roads get so bad, I'd have to wonder if some evil bastard wasn't going out of his way to try and make the world worst traffic system.

There was never any reason for people in the west to vote for FF, they consistently ignored the west to follow the party line.

leninbenjamin

welcome to the west of ireland lads... the land the Celtic Tiger forgot.

ultimately, anything on a grand scale would require more than local initiative, which is sadly lacking for these parts.

cornbb

I'd be inclined to agree with the OP. If you look at what happened in the last 5-10 years in Limerick (similar size, also in the west of Ireland) they have a pretty good road infrastructure encircling the city, the main drainage project took place, the city centre got several major facelifts, especially near the river, the University has pretty much doubled in size, and they're building a tunnel under the Shannon.

Granted, Limerick has had a lot of catching up to do, but it seems like they "made hay" during the boom years whereas Galway doesn't seem to have changed that much.

tonyhiggins

I was just about to say the same thing about Limerick, they seem to have got much better value for money...

coconut5

cornbb wrote: »

If you look at what happened in the last 5-10 years in Limerick (similar size, also in the west of Ireland) they have a pretty good road infrastructure encircling the city

If by 'good infrastructure', you mean loads of roundabouts, then I can't agree. It takes SO LONG to get through Limerick to Galway, you are going round and round and round for ages to get anywhere. Also, Limerick is not the west of Ireland.

galvianlord

Alot of it would be developer-lead development in places but that has not happened in town in quite some time, one nice building down beside the Mercy though. I know there are plans for Galway Shopping Centre in the pipeline but there has been delays with that. The City Council has to play its part as well but it doesnt seem to have done a huge amount to get things moving here, it just seems to take forever!

Webbs

ScumLord wrote: »

The only thing that really annoys me is the roads. There poorly made and had absolutely no thought put into them. It's hard to see how anyone could accidental let the roads get so bad, I'd have to wonder if some evil bastard wasn't going out of his way to try and make the world worst traffic system.

There was never any reason for people in the west to vote for FF, they consistently ignored the west to follow the party line.

The roads were developed in response to increased traffic but with little thought that the traffic would increase further. Isnt that a problem for mostl of Ireland that in a way the boom took everyone by surprise and by the time people had worked out that it meant more people, more cars, more money etc then it was all too late.
I am sure that 15years ago traffic wasnt a problem in Galway, there are unique problems for Galway including its geography (lots of water surrounding it), its age, medieval cities dont do cars very well!
Saying all that there is still no excuse for better traffic management with corodinated lights , flyovers, pedestrian underpasses, junctions instead of tiny roundabouts - the list goes on

cornbb

coconut5 wrote: »

If by 'good infrastructure', you mean loads of roundabouts, then I can't agree. It takes SO LONG to get through Limerick to Galway, you are going round and round and round for ages to get anywhere. Also, Limerick is not the west of Ireland.

It depends on where you're coming from. If you're talking about coming from the Cork side, there will be a dual carriageway and tunnel in place before long that will take you from Patrickswell all the way past Ennis without traffic lights or roundabouts. Plus it'll link up with the Dublin road too. Compare that to the measly few kms of dual carriageways or 4-lane roads that go around Galway.

ScumLord

Webbs wrote: »

The roads were developed in response to increased traffic but with little thought that the traffic would increase further. Isnt that a problem for mostl of Ireland that in a way the boom took everyone by surprise and by the time people had worked out that it meant more people, more cars, more money etc then it was all too late.

I don't accept this excuse that it all took us by surprise. Ireland was a late bloomer that had the experience of Europe to back it up yet we didn't use that.

But a prime example of terrible planing is Claregalway. It's not just the fact they never did anything to the road up until recently, it's the fact they did everything within their power to make it worse with idiotic town planning that just made claregalway even more of a bottle neck. It's not just that they didn't do the work properly or didn't have the funding, it's what work they did do had no thought put into it.

galwayrush

We missed the boat because of small minded councillers, serial objectors and totally inefficient local politicians.( well i suppose they were very efficient looking after their own personal needs)

Amazotheamazing

I think Galway benefitted a lot from the boom, but nowhere really benefitted as much as Dublin. If you want to see somewhere that lost out in the boom go to Roscommon or Longford. God, it's like time stood still in some of the towns in those counties.

I'm not sure if the comparison with Limerick is beneficial. Limerick isn't hemmed in by the ocean which severely limits how much Galway can be developed. The failure to invest in any sort of high rise in the city centre in favour of crap two story sprawl hasn't done Galway any favours.

galwayrush

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

. The failure to invest in any sort of high rise in the city centre in favour of crap two story sprawl hasn't done Galway any favours.

So true.
That was my refrence to our small minded Councillers.
They are often 'outraged' or 'appalled' at the sheer bulk / scale of a three storey building.:pac: They should really try and get out of the country (even county) more

Malice

With regard to the roads, I think a lot of the traffic congestion is caused by whatever moron (or collection of morons) decided to build housing in Knocknacarra on one side of the river and industry in Ballybrit on the other. Surely it couldn't have taken much cop-on to see the problem? When there are only two ways to cross the river of course there are going to be traffic problems even with a moderate amount of cars!

KevR

galwayrush wrote: »

We missed the boat because of small minded councillers, serial objectors and totally inefficient local politicians.( well i suppose they were very efficient looking after their own personal needs)

If we just look at how long it took and the amount of pulling and dragging there was with Mutton Island and now with the Bypass/Northern Ring Road it's clear why Galway has missed out on a lot of things. People actually objected to clean water in Galway Bay and people are actually objecting to be able to drive around the top of the City at 120kmh instead of driving through the City at 1.2kmh.

Robbo

KevR wrote: »

If we just look at how long it took and the amount of pulling and dragging there was with Mutton Island and now with the Bypass/Northern Ring Road it's clear why Galway has missed out on a lot of things. People actually objected to clean water in Galway Bay and people are actually objecting to be able to drive around the top of the City at 120kmh instead of driving through the City at 1.2kmh.

It is mind boggling. I've noticed group with the wonderfully floral title of "Hands Across The Corrib" have incorporated as a limited company and are planning to object the **** out of the outer bypass. Marvellous.

?Cee?view

KevR,

Couldn't agree more with you.

galvianlord

speaking of serial objectors, did anyone know that everyone's favourite British blow-in Hambelton ran for election in 1999? Seemed to be a once off occurrence:

http://electionsireland.org/candidate.cfm?ID=4642

Malice

KevR wrote: »

the amount of pulling and dragging there was with Mutton Island

In fairness Galway Bay is a very popular tourist destination/beauty spot so I am still quite surprised that the powers that be decided the only place they could put a sewage treatment plant was in the middle of it. Of course that was probably the only place they could put it on account of the cursed NIMBYs.

Does anyone know what other coastal cities do with their sewage treatment requirements?