Castlefield, Clonsilla: markings on old maps

Finglas Incubus

I was playing around with the overlay feature on the OSIs website and came across what looks like an elliptical and circular track (Ortho 1995 map) where Castlefield estate in Clonsilla is now situated. Does anyone know what this represents?

Gaspode

Looks like a horse training/racing track maybe? A 1997 map of Dublin shows a 'Gables Stud' near there.
Edit: no, gables stud is other side of the train tracks.

Finglas Incubus

Gaspode wrote: »

Looks like a horse training/racing track maybe? A

Spot on Gaspode - Lohunda Park training stables. I knew that there were studs in the area and that Lohunda House existed but never knew the lands were used by Bolger to train championship race horses.

Classic-winning trainer Sir Hugh Nugent made an offer to move the operation to his establishment at Lohunda Park in Clonsilla (“it’s now a housing estate”) — an offer Bolger grabbed with both hands. He says he would never have moved to the Curragh because the thought of a potential Classic-winner getting loose on the wide open spaces of the Kildare plain was completely anathema.

Bolger stayed at Lohunda until 1982 and mixed his racing enterprises — both national hunt and flat — with equal success (it’s a little known fact that Bolger has two Irish Champion Hurdles under his belt, as well as numerous other successes under hunt rules;

Source: http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/being-bolger-6971.html

The Blanchardstown SC and other developments occupy all that farmland now. Horse training was an important source of employment in the area and the trainers who were known to us, included Sir Hugh Nugent in Clonsilla (now Lohunda), who had prolific winners in Dusky Boy and Red Slipper, and Bertie Kerr near Clonee ( near Ongar).

Source: http://www.stbrigidsgaa.com/History/BlastfromthePast-BrigidsHistory/FrankRussell-BrigidsHistory/Title,4363,en.html

When Sole Power blitzed a high class field in the Nunthorpe Stakes at York’s Ebor meeting last August at the eye-popping price of 100/1, his trainer Edward Lynam was catapulted into the limelight. “A typical Dub” as he describes himself, he dealt with it all readily.
Winning a first Group 1 is a significant milestone though, especially when you’ve waited 27 years. In just 57.14 seconds, Lynam became what must surely be the longest overnight sensation ever.

The Dunshaughlin-based handler is, in his own words, an “outsider”, with very little racing pedigree. While his uncles, Jimmy and Eamon O’Connell were trainers, it was the fact that Lynam was born and reared beside Phoenix Park racecourse that was piqued his interest. As a child, he was bitten by the bug.
When he was 12, his father bought Sir Hugh Nugent’s Lohunda Park stables with the intention to develop the property. While waiting to do so, he rented the premises to a newcomer named Jim Bolger, who did very well there before moving to Coolcullen. Lynam had spent time with Bolger learning his trade and took over in 1983.

Source: http://www.daraghoconchuir.ie/blog.php?id=1020

I find the last quote regarding Edward Lynam historically interesting, the Lynam family, under the business name La Vista Ltd, own the undeveloped lands at both ends of the Clonsilla link road and are behind the various planning submissions that have been lodged at both sites over the past 12 or 13 years.

Codpeas

Finglas Incubus wrote: »

I find the last quote regarding Edward Lynam historically interesting, the Lynam family, under the business name La Vista Ltd, own the undeveloped lands at both ends of the Clonsilla link road and are behind the various planning submissions that have been lodged at both sites over the past 12 or 13 years.

The Lynam family have developed much of the area around there under various companies such as:
Lynam Homes Ltd. (Sorrell Park, Limelawn Park)
EP Lynam Properties Ltd. (Aspen Wood, Castlefield?)
E. & J. Lynam Properties Ltd.

ozmo

Rare photo here - got it from a scan of an old Postcard... never seen another photo of this building.

Its the big house that owned that training track - the one that was in the center of the Castlefield estate (osi link).
You can match up the trees in the photo to the ones in the OSI maps mentioned above. The stables are to the left.

ciaran76

As kids back in the late 80s early 90s We used to watch them going around that track.

They didn't want us there so we used to hide but the noise as up to 10 horses galloped by was impressive.

We used to be chased away which was a laugh as kid but they just didn't want us spooking the horses or worse getting ourselves hurt.

I spent a lot of times in those fields as a kid and hiding from the farmer as we called him.

Finglas Incubus

Interesting... I grew up on the other side of Blanch and would have been fairly familiar with Clonsilla at the time, or so I thought. I never really gave much thought to what was behind the hedgerows. Any idea when Lohunda House was demolised?