Why were the city and council ok with Basements in a flood plain?

Outkast_IRE · 23-11-2009 05:11PM #1

Just from a common sense point of view why would someone approve a Basment carpark for the Kingsley and basement areas for the county hall,victoria mills countless others i cant think of , I know this was a very bad flood but that area has seen it this near this level before .
Why are they approving basements on floodplains?

Ucc glucksman gallery stored all their art in the basement on a floodplain !
Mardyke arena right next to the river that building should of been built at a higher level day one .
County hall archives are servers in the basement of a flood plain good call there !

rotinaj · 23-11-2009 09:17PM

The land the kingsly is built on should never of been built on. Even the dogs on the road know that area floods bad every year. Whoever gave permission for that carpark should be shot.

Another reason is that land was gifted to the people of Cork by its last owner. The council had no right to sell it

nacl · 23-11-2009 09:44PM

Give us back our Lee Baths.

God is on our side

moceri · 24-11-2009 09:15PM

If You ever had to Deal with some of the Personnell in the Planning office, you would understand perfectly as to how easily these sort of decisions were made. I once had a planner tell me I could not build a 6 Foot fence on top of a raised embankment because that was "a Hypothetical Situation" .

bladebrew · 24-11-2009 10:02PM

yeah building an underground carpark beside the kingsley was insane! that photo of it filled to the top is scary!

Leeside · 24-11-2009 10:15PM

I wonder were there many cars parked overnight in the basement. Write offs obviously but if they did not have comprehensive cover, would they stand any chance suing the hotel?

mahamageehad · 24-11-2009 10:18PM

Kinsley was a nightmare and so was the art gallery in UCC!!! It's crazy!!!

Owen · 24-11-2009 10:22PM

Leeside · 24-11-2009 10:25PM

Doesn't the new Dunnes Stores building on Patricks St also have a basement. The grocery dept is located there. All perishable items!

cornbb · 24-11-2009 10:25PM

You're right OP, its a crazy situation. If anyone should be held accountable for this disaster, it should be the bureaucrats and engineers who allowed these places to be built where they are. At the very least they should not be allowed to practice their professions again.

rebel.ranter · 24-11-2009 11:06PM

Cork is built on 21 islands, the location of the city as a whole is a disaster. It is only compounding the problem with all the reclaimed land & underground carparks.
The whole Penrose Wharf area is reclaimed, it used to be where cattle ships bound for Manchester & Liverpool used to dock, now it is one less place the water can go.
I would also seriously question the Clarion hotel underground carpark, as well as all those mentioned previously. How, how, how can these things get planning but a one-off build has to jump through hoop after hoop over one septic tank!

rebel girl 15 · 25-11-2009 03:32AM

Leeside wrote: »

I wonder were there many cars parked overnight in the basement. Write offs obviously but if they did not have comprehensive cover, would they stand any chance suing the hotel?

Heard that there were some lovely brand new cars down there - Audis and VW's. Unloaded them off a transporter the day before according to another poster on here - new dealership was opening on Orchard Road??

rotinaj · 25-11-2009 03:38AM

rebel.ranter wrote: »

Cork is built on 21 islands, the location of the city as a whole is a disaster. It is only compounding the problem with all the reclaimed land & underground carparks.
The whole Penrose Wharf area is reclaimed, it used to be where cattle ships bound for Manchester & Liverpool used to dock, now it is one less place the water can go.
I would also seriously question the Clarion hotel underground carpark, as well as all those mentioned previously. How, how, how can these things get planning but a one-off build has to jump through hoop after hoop over one septic tank!

€€€€€€€€€ thats how they get permission

rotinaj · 25-11-2009 03:39AM

rebel girl 15 wrote: »

Heard that there were some lovely brand new cars down there - Audis and VW's. Unloaded them off a transporter the day before according to another poster on here - new dealership was opening on Orchard Road??

From what I heard the cars were loaded beck up on the transporter Thursday evening

CarMuppet · 25-11-2009 12:59PM

PaintDoctor wrote: »

oh so true...

CarMuppet · 25-11-2009 01:06PM

rotinaj wrote: »

From what I heard the cars were loaded beck up on the transporter Thursday evening

Well from the blog on the Kingsley it said "Audi were having a car lauch over the the few days and again this turned in to disaster for them before it began, again they were so understanding and extremely helpful as were all our guests. Go raibh mile maith agaibh go leir!!!"

Page as follows: http://www.kingsleyhotel.com/modules/blog/FullPostView.aspx?Postid=5&treeid=116

Hope they did get the cars out of there... but glad to hear no one was hurt!

curious321 · 21-12-2009 12:04AM

I hear this was the first flood of any kind at the Kingsley or the city Hall. Is this correct??

D-Generate · 21-12-2009 12:18AM

Lee Fields floods every year but I never knew it to reach all the way down to where the Kingsley was.
Word on the street is that there is structural damage to the hotel now caused by them being prevented from pumping out the water and conducting clean up work before insurance assessors got there for Audi.

parsi · 21-12-2009 10:32AM

rebel.ranter wrote: »

Cork is built on 21 islands, the location of the city as a whole is a disaster. It is only compounding the problem with all the reclaimed land & underground carparks.
The whole Penrose Wharf area is reclaimed, it used to be where cattle ships bound for Manchester & Liverpool used to dock, now it is one less place the water can go.

Aee you sure about that ?

The infrastructure all seems to be dating back to the railway age and beyond.

Oafley Jones · 21-12-2009 11:44AM

parsi wrote: »

Aee you sure about that ?

The infrastructure all seems to be dating back to the railway age and beyond.

That's correct. I was amazed when I found out in First year Archaeology. They still don't know when they were filled n.

parsi · 21-12-2009 07:38PM

Ah. I didn't know that.

However that does imply that it was done a long long time ago (maybe the same time as the SOuth Mall) and not in the recent past (as r.r would seem to imply) ?

21-12-2009 09:37PM

D-Generate wrote: »

Word on the street is that there is structural damage to the hotel now caused by them being prevented from pumping out the water and conducting clean up work before insurance assessors got there for Audi.

Complete and utter horse**** re the reason being they had to wait for Audi insurance assessors.

Re the opening question, any one who though basement were a good idea anywhere within 100 yards of the Lee is a complete moron, countless City Hall engineers should be gettig their walking papers due to the incompetence and sheer lack of common sense displayed. I have seen engineers in American Multi National get sacked over much less.

castie · 21-12-2009 09:53PM

Can we keep the supposition to a minimum please

parsi · 22-12-2009 10:05AM

I think we need to look beyond the Planners (who were being screamed at by their Minister to be more development-friendly, more business-friendly) to other players.

Who in their right mind would commission an expensive gallery building only feet from the South Channel - at water level separated by a very small levee ? Who in their right mind would design such a building ? Who would decide to store their works of art in the basement of such a building ?

Who in their right mind would decide to build an underground carpark in an area notorious for flooding and who would accept the design commission ?

I walked through UCC a few weeks ago and was very surprised to see how close the Glucksmann was to the water compared to the Mardyke Arena which had a running track between it and the water.

Why were the city and council ok with Basements in a flood plain?

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