What will regional Irish towns look like in 50 years.

6541

I current live in a regional town, about 12,000 people. The amount of building going on is unbelievable. I would say every approach road into the town has big estates currently under construction.

Everywhere you look you see construction.

Autonomous cars will be in use and they will drive more efficiently than humans no one will have a car outside their house you will use an app to call a car you will pay monthly for different car plans. The cars will be in use 24 hours a day.

Which is a long winded way of saying we won't need as much roads

Pauliedragon

They'll all be full of feckin foreigners I tells ya. There be no lrish left we're being overran as it is the feckers comin here taking over our towns😀

As long as they bring their delishious ethnic food with them and set up reasonable priced takeaways I'm cool with them coming here.

BlueSkyDreams

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709180#Comment_122709180

Cars will be banned by then. You will be on the bus.

Gary_dunne

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709205#Comment_122709205

Adding a bit more culture to the majority of regional towns in Ireland wouldn't be a bad thing at all.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709180#Comment_122709180

While I don't disagree with the idea that most people will choose not to own a car in the future I think the conclusion is that rather than needing less roads we will actually need less parking spaces.

Right now the majority of private vehicles spend almost all of their time parked up: outside homes, businesses, shopping centres, schools, hospitals, gyms etc etc. This actually takes up a colossal amount of land when added together and is a really inefficient use of land.

timmyntc

More sprawl

Regional towns will be choked with traffic and sprawling housing estates even moreso than in the past.

Repeating mistakes made for the past 50 years really.

cj maxx

Probably supermarkets on the edge of town with a kfc or mc d’s close by . Most corner shops and small pubs closed .

Loafing Oaf

downtown Carlow in 2075

TinyMuffin

limerick will still be the same.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122712612#Comment_122712612

the building in the middle is the legion of Mary.

I’m very familiar with Malahide in Co Dublin. On the outskirts at each end there were always lots farms. A number have been sold to developers for housing. It’s no longer quaint and quiet. A real pity what’s happening, used to be a real privilege driving out of the city and it’s nearer suburbs out to Malahide, quaint, so quiet, easy paced, now it’s just not the same, constant busy traffic on narrow country roads…all businesses like shops, pubs, supermarkets, are packed. Not in a good way. Will get multiple times worse.

Ubbquittious

No more pubs, no more shop, no petrol station, loads of those ugly white/gray newbuilds with corner windows and that grey box thing sticking out the side. Nobody on the streets, eerily quiet.

Maybe the odd drone flying overhead with anti-gravity drive. It will feel like you're trapped in a CAD program

Ubbquittious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709180#Comment_122709180

You still need a road to every place. Unless they are going to be flying overhead with antigravity drive. Then the roads will slowly turn into greenways

Gary_dunne

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122712721#Comment_122712721

It sounds like the village is thriving. I've been out to Malahide and on a sunny day it's one of the nicest places in Dublin, full of people enjoying food and drinks in the sun on New Street, around the harbour packed with families and the castle grounds car park is always nearly full but the park itself never looks overcrowded.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122714136#Comment_122714136

Ubbquittious' ancestor:

No more opium dens, no horse change stations, loads of those ugly tiled roof cottages with glass windows and those toilet things inside. Nobody dying of cholera on the streets, eerily quiet.

Maybe the odd Zeppelin flying overhead with anti-gravity drive. You'll feel like you're trapped in a Jules Verne book.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709306#Comment_122709306

The reason for less use of roads is that the self drive cars will be way more efficient that humans and will drive with only millimeters between them, so far more cars will be abel to use the same road space, car crashes will be a thing of the past.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122717178#Comment_122717178

That will allow you to remove lanes from motorways but it's not going to remove roads completely. After all what is the function of a road? It's to link different locations. That requirement is still going to remain regardless of how efficiently the traffic moves on them. Ireland has a massive population of dispersed housing in rural areas that is serviced by a network of small roads and laneways. If you add up all of the kilometres of road network in the country those are the vast majority and you can't get rid of them.

John_Rambo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122716962#Comment_122716962

Yeah, it's a buzzing hive of activity. Other seaside villages in Dublin are thriving with a return to butchers, bakers, barbers and other local businesses and an appreciation of the beaches and coastline.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122716962#Comment_122716962

two ways of looking at it I suppose. I’m sure the local economy is, has to be but going by what my family out there tell me, but traffic 🥵 , queuing in shops, having to make reservations during the week for restaurants they used be able to walk up to and just a lot less rural, quaint and quiet. So thriving in one aspect,a sort of a pain in most others. I’m not sure quality of life for longtime residents is as it was, not bad but , still.

Montage of Feck

A US style urban hellscape of car clogged suburbia.

L Grey

Every school will have its very own Enoch.

Hovercars for all.

All road signs will be in German.

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122717178#Comment_122717178

Could the cars use a hyperloop?

Gary_dunne

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122719860#Comment_122719860

It's always going to be that way as any coastal village will attract people to it and Malahide's catchment area is very densely populated.

The longtime residents don't own the village and if their biggest complaint is they have to queue in shops or book a restaurant they're doing grand in life.

Sgt Hartman

That junction in Malahide on the main road where the flower shop is, is a nightmare, even for pedestrians trying to cross there. It takes an age for the green man to appear. Despite that I do like Malahide. There’s a good variety of shops and restaurants, and the walk along the estuary is nice also.

mazdamiatamx5

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122712721#Comment_122712721

Sounds like you are catching up with Leopardstown/Foxrock - and I don't mean that in a good way.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122719860#Comment_122719860

Only posh people from Malahide would ever think Malahide is "rural" or "quiet"

You can't book or walk into a restaurant in rural Ireland cause it doesn't fekin have any.

Quality of life on Malahide is way up the top end in Ireland whatever way you look at it. Life's tough because I have to queue in a shop 🤣

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122719941#Comment_122719941

https://waymo.com/ They already have a self driving taxi service in California it's only a matter of time before all cars are self drive.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720082#Comment_122720082

only posh people ? Can you speak for them all ? 😉. I doubt my relatives would identify as posh and I myself have been going there since I was a nipper and witnessed the changes myself in fairness. Life is less agreeable when everywhere is busier. That’s everywhere not just Malahide. Pain in the ass now navigating / travelling around it being the main issue… much of this is documented online by residents.

CliffHangeroner

They'll look like the same backward sh it kickin kips that they are now.

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720112#Comment_122720112

It won't really.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720154#Comment_122720154

Alright so, it won't happen just because you say so.

magicbastarder

irish regional towns will consist entirely of bypasses with too many roundabouts which go nowhere except to a lidl or an aldi.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720117#Comment_122720117

No one ever identifies as posh.

And I doubt Malahide is what anyone thinks when they are asked about "regional towns"

yagan

If the current demographic models work there may need to be more pedestrian zones and clustered assisted living developments.

halkar

Since we are still in stone age we may move to iron age. With a bit of push.

Grayson

Knowing Ireland, it will be massive urban sprawl, and no bus service, or **** sporadic bus services. There will be regular trains to dublin, but they'll be too few and not frequent enough. People will be sitting on the roof.

I see sheep

Every town will have a Monorail

KaneToad

The govt has pissed away one of their biggest chances to ensure the best development of regional towns. Remote working was the silver bullet.

But instead we'll have the continued growth of regional towns to be dormitory/dead towns that clear out Mon-Fri as commuters head to Dublin or other city.

McDonalds, KFC at the edge of town in fact any retail at the edge of towns should be stoped, all retail should be as far as possible town center, schools libraries, GP's all should be within walking distance of housing developments.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720583#Comment_122720583

They don’t identify as posh simply because they come from working class backgrounds and worked for the good things in life that they amassed.

it’s described as both a village and seaside town. 😉. But let’s not split hairs..

6541

Amazingly diverse comments on this thread.

Hopefully less shabby. Numerous Irish towns look beautiful on the outskirts, and then their centres are grubby kips. E.g. Cobh, Fermoy, Mallow, Clonakilty.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720167#Comment_122720167

But it will happen just because you say so?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720729#Comment_122720729

I've heard those things are awfully loud.

Joe 90

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122717178#Comment_122717178

So the operating system for cars won't be Windows?

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720729#Comment_122720729

is there a chance that the tracks will bend?

For Forks Sake

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122724002#Comment_122724002

Not on your life, my Hindu friend.

L Grey

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122720729#Comment_122720729

That's more of a Shelbyville idea.

Fr Tod Umptious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122723976#Comment_122723976

It glides as softly as a cloud

con___manx1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122709255#Comment_122709255

Yea but will you be able to see the doctor or dentist or will your kid get a place in the local school with the town being over run with foreign people. There are 2 year waiting lists to get into a gp practice in my town.

99% of people I know are all for integration including myself but only to a certain degree. I wouldn't want to be a minority in my own town. This has happened in many places in France England and Germany. The population has grown 1 million in the last 10 years.