How to pick the right neighbourhood

moonbiter

Hi,
I am moving to Dublin in a couple of weeks. I have secured a job near North Dock (but the company will move somewhere in city center a certain point in the future). I would move there with my girlfriend (she will look for a job once we will be there). We would like to go for a 1-bedroom apartment somewhere near the center.

In picking up the neighbourhood I was considering:
- Red Luas is sort-of-unsafe (from what I read) so I should not count on that for commuting
- I don't know how reliable are bus, if I take a bus from the south side of the city I am going to be stuck for hours in the traffic? Ideally I would like to not spend more than 30 minutes commuting (60 total minutes per day)
- I am trying to map which neighbourhoods are safe and which are not and it seems crazy, people write things like "that road is safe, the one nearby is totally unsafe, but the next one is super-safe"
- I cannot find a good, detailed map of neighbourhoods, just the zone (Dublin 1, 2, 3...)
- what else should I consider?

Any help on this decision?

VG31

If you want a good map of Dublin, the Ordnance Survey Ireland Dublin road atlas is good. Otherwise have a look at Google Maps (street view will be useful as well).

spurious

Everywhere is safe.
There are some areas have more obvious signs of poverty, more anti-social behaviour, more late night noise etc., but everywhere is safe.

schemingbohemia

The Red line is generally safe, it does have a number of scrotes who hassle people but numbers wise the likely impact on you is minimal.

To be honest your budget is going to determine where you live, particularly with your 30 minute max commute. Buses don't tend to get significantly delayed in traffic very often due to the bus lanes.

I think Dublin is very safe, I lived just off North King Street for 4 years and never had any hassle. If it were me I'd look at Stonybatter and Ringsend/Sandymount first, but as said budget will determine where you can look.

moonbiter

Well, I would think to spend up to 1300 E per month, do you think is it reasonable for a decent small apartment in the center?

Polar101

moonbiter wrote: »

Well, I would think to spend up to 1300 E per month, do you think is it reasonable for a decent small apartment in the center?

That should be enough to be able to choose an apartment by location, not just price.

hmmm

Here's a good city centre search:
http://www.daft.ie/searchrental.daft?s[cc_id]=ct1&s[a_id]=ga1&s[mnp]=&s[mxp]=1300&s[mnb]=&s[mxb]=&s[pt_id]=&search=1&s[a_id_transport]=0&s[move_in_date]=0&s[furn]=0&s[search_type]=rental&s[refreshmap]=1

Click on "Map View" and you can get a visual representation of where places are.

Agree re the safety - in comparison to most cities, Dublin is pretty safe. But you will be living in a big city, so you will need to be careful - avoid rundown areas, unlit quiet streets at night etc.

tawnyowl

Another useful street map is http://www.openstreetmap.org.

Toby Take a Bow

moonbiter wrote: »

Well, I would think to spend up to 1300 E per month, do you think is it reasonable for a decent small apartment in the center?

You could get a nice apartment for that, maybe even a two bed.

carlmango11

spurious wrote: »

Everywhere is safe.

Ah here.

Toby Take a Bow

carlmango11 wrote: »

Ah here.

The more I live around Dublin, the more I agree with his/her comment. I've lived in places now that, growing up, I would have thought of as seriously dodgy. I walk through places now (after work, at night, at 3am) that I had heard all the horror stories about.

hfallada

I have lived in Dublin for 20 years and I guarantee you are as likely to have a crime committed against you in an upper middle class suburb as the inner city. A local Garda agreed and said you think all the crime is in the city, buts also in the suburbs. All the serious crimes you hear in the paper are committed against people who have a "colourful past" or "occupation". As long as you dont use your phone openly on the street, you will be grand.

harry Bailey esq

carlmango11 wrote: »

Ah here.

Dublin is perfectly safe,but the city centre is overrun with heroin addicts.while they might seem intimidating at first to a newcomer they are generally in very poor health so harmless enough really.Most of the serious crime is gang related so if your not involved in that you don't have much to worry about.I live in a part of finglas that the gobsh1te hack Paul Williams once dubbed "the murder triangle" but i know from experience that its much safer to walk around here at night than it is in many provincial towns and cities,take a stroll around tralee or clonmel or ennis at kicking out time and you'll realise how safe Dublin is.

John_Rambo

harry Bailey esq wrote: »

take a stroll around tralee or clonmel or ennis at kicking out time and you'll realise how safe Dublin is.

This.

Wear a Munster, kerry, Donegal etc.. jersey around Dublin at kicking out time, you'll be fine. Wear a Leinster or Dublin jersey around kicking time in the towns mentioned at kicking out time and watch what happens. :eek:

discus

My god, that's a very true point. Many the time, I've been given a hard time on a night out for being a Dub outside the pale.

desertcircus

If you're willing to contemplate cycling to and from work, then you don't need to worry about traffic; no matter how choked up the city gets, you'll be able to get around without trouble. 1300 a month will give you a good-quality one-bed more or less anywhere you want, so it's up to you where you'd like to live - and that depends on the kind of things you want around you.

doolox

Many people like to be beside the seaside, Sandymount and Clontarf would get you easy access to long seashore walks parks etc.

Others like areas around the Phoenix Park, to the West of the City and areas Like Castleknock, Chapelisod etc come to mind. Access to the River Liffey to the West can be got at Lucan, Celbridge etc but these are maybe too far to be in a 30 minute commute, more like an hour unless you decide to go by motorbike.

The southside is easily accessable by DART, a coastline-hugging commuter rail service which runs to the likes of Dunlaoighre and Dalkey and Killiney and Sandyford and Dundrum. Plenty of scope for things to do here if into sailing long pier walks and easy access to beaches at Bray and Greystones on the DART.

moonbiter

From what I read (including the comments you kindly provided in this thread) the city is generally safe (anti-social behavior and annoying drunk people can be found everywhere) but still thieves are more frequent in the north side of the city. Would you confirm that?
Does it apply also to Dublin 1, I mean, it is generally speaking more frequent to have your house robbed in Dublin 1 in respect to Dublin 2?

Thank you for any comment you provided and for the ones you will provide!

donaghs

moonbiter wrote: »

Hi,
I am moving to Dublin in a couple of weeks. I have secured a job near North Dock (but the company will move somewhere in city center a certain point in the future). I would move there with my girlfriend (she will look for a job once we will be there). We would like to go for a 1-bedroom apartment somewhere near the center.

In picking up the neighbourhood I was considering:
- Red Luas is sort-of-unsafe (from what I read) so I should not count on that for commuting
- I don't know how reliable are bus, if I take a bus from the south side of the city I am going to be stuck for hours in the traffic? Ideally I would like to not spend more than 30 minutes commuting (60 total minutes per day)
- I am trying to map which neighbourhoods are safe and which are not and it seems crazy, people write things like "that road is safe, the one nearby is totally unsafe, but the next one is super-safe"
- I cannot find a good, detailed map of neighbourhoods, just the zone (Dublin 1, 2, 3...)
- what else should I consider?

Any help on this decision?

Which are is "better"/safer than others will always bring out defensiveness are contrary points of view. Leaving the opinions of individuals aside, you can see from the prices property and rents that the general population do consider some areas considered more "desirable" than others.

Taking your criteria into view, how about the south docks area? Sandymount is probably more expensive. You could cycle to North Dock or take DART to Connolly.

I'm not so keen on living near the North Dock as I don't like the Sherriff St area, and have mixed feeling about East Wall having lived there before.

Have you ever been to Dublin before?

Also, break-ins happen everywhere. But I'd hazard a guess from what I've read and heard that at the moment its the wealthier suburbs that are being most heavily targeted by burglars.

miss no stars

moonbiter wrote: »

Does it apply also to Dublin 1, I mean, it is generally speaking more frequent to have your house robbed in Dublin 1 in respect to Dublin 2?

Thank you for any comment you provided and for the ones you will provide!

I don't think so. Some of the worst areas are in Dublin 2. The northside of Dublin has a worse reputation than it deserves, mostly given to it by people who live on the southside and only ever go to the northside to get to the airport.

Your best bet is to just look around you when you're looking for somewhere to live - are there gangs of teenagers hanging around at the corner drinking smirnoff ice? Is there broken glass everywhere? Does it feel very run-down and unsafe? If not, you're probably ok.