JP Morgan Boss Slams Dublin Transport Infrastructure

ClovenHoof · 18-05-2017 3:51pm #1

Says it'll be the main reason why Dublin will probably lose out on the bulk of Brexit relocations.

Wonder if the "buses are enough", "Dublin too small for a metro!" ..and Ciarian Cuffe "western rail corridor comes first" are happy now.

coylemj · 18-05-2017 4:41pm

Fine, let them feck off to Paris or Frankfurt.

Seriously, the housing market here is bad enough at the moment, imagine what the sudden influx of 1,000 or so bankers on massive salaries will do to it, we simply cannot absorb them, never mind what they think of our transport 'infrastructure'.

schemingbohemia · 18-05-2017 4:47pm

ClovenHoof wrote: »

Says it'll be the main reason why Dublin will probably lose out on the bulk of Brexit relocations.

Wonder if the "buses are enough", "Dublin too small for a metro!" ..and Ciarian Cuffe "western rail corridor comes first" are happy now.

Did s/he say this to you in person or could you perhaps provide a link?

Boulevardier · 18-05-2017 4:50pm

Some London bankers apparently gave the lack of Michelin-star restaurants in Dublin as a reason for them not to relocate!

Nevertheless, you are right. Housing and transport are potentially fatal problems. if so, we will richly deserve to lose those jobs because of our failure to bother to do anything about either issue.

Phoebas · 18-05-2017 4:52pm

coylemj wrote: »

Fine, let them feck off to Paris or Frankfurt.

Seriously, the housing market here is bad enough at the moment, imagine what the sudden influx of 1,000 or so bankers on massive salaries will do to it, we simply cannot absorb them, never mind what they think of our transport 'infrastructure'.

They are coming to Dublin - just bought a building that can hold 1000 staff.

Whatever they think about the infrastructure, JP Morgan think we can absorb them.

bk · 18-05-2017 4:57pm

I've long be saying this. We are far too small minded in this country.

We have many great natural advantages:
- English speaking
- Lots of well educated people
- Generally very good reputation around the world, people like the idea of coming here to work (at least until they look into the details of housing, transport, etc.)
- Business friendly government

But we then totally shot ourselves in the foot by not offering the infrastructure that such companies and their employees require:

- Lots of very tall office buildings in the same location
- Lots of very tall apartment buildings near them, with quality but affordable apartments for their employess.
- Medium density (6 to 8 storeys) through out the rest of the city, with decent, affordable, quality apartments in them.
- High quality public transport throughout the city, to make fast and easy to get around (Metros, Darts, trams, high quality bus services), oh and at least the core network running 24/7
- High quality bike paths and bike infrastructure.
- Modern, non religious schools near by (remember many of the foreigners who come here aren't Catholic or religious at all and don't want to put up with the bs catholic education system here).

Brexit is going to hurt our economy greatly. We had a golden opportunity to become the alternative to London post Brexit and limit some of that damage. But no unfortunately too much small mindedness will continue to hold us back.

draiochtanois · 18-05-2017 5:16pm

This post has been deleted.

SPDUB · 18-05-2017 7:12pm

bk wrote: »

Brexit is going to hurt our economy greatly. We had a golden opportunity to become the alternative to London post Brexit and limit some of that damage. But no unfortunately too much small mindedness will continue to hold us back.

There is various reasons to decry lack of various infrastructure in this country but Brexit isn't one of them given A it only happened 11 months ago and B nobody actually thought they would win

bk · 18-05-2017 7:22pm

SPDUB wrote: »

There is various reasons to decry lack of various infrastructure in this country but Brexit isn't one of them given A it only happened 11 months ago and B nobody actually thought they would win

Fair enough, but either way we should have been building the infrastructure to compete with London, either way, just like Frankfurt, Amsterdam, etc. have been doing.

MY point about Brexit is more that we should have been better placed to take advantage of it and that it is pretty insane that in the past 11 months, our government continues to long finger the necessary investment, rather then promising to build it and capture as much of the investment as possible.

Del.Monte · 18-05-2017 8:18pm

Ah, but when Brexit proves to have been the correct decision all the jobs and investment will be flowing into Britain.

Hollister11 · 18-05-2017 8:22pm

10 minute DARTS were due a year ago, and still aren't here due to driver strikes. That's laughable, a company being held back because the workers aren't happy.

Sack them. It's a pretty good job, there will be plenty of takers.

ClovenHoof · 18-05-2017 8:27pm

Phoebas wrote: »

They are coming to Dublin - just bought a building that can hold 1000 staff.

Whatever they think about the infrastructure, JP Morgan think we can absorb them.

But he said in the Times business section that it won't be a trend as Dublin comes out very poor in surveys for no metro. JP will be the exception. Not the rule.

I can only imagine the typical Irish business gob****e still acting and looking like Arthur Daley taking his cigar out while listening to this going "wha?"

Phoebas · 18-05-2017 8:51pm

ClovenHoof wrote: »

But he said in the Times business section that it won't be a trend as Dublin comes out very poor in surveys for no metro. JP will be the exception. Not the rule.

I didn't see this thing about him saying that 'it won't be a trend as Dublin comes out very poor in surveys for no metro' or that we will 'lose out on the bulk of Brexit relocations'
Did he actually single out our lack of a metro or is this you paraphrasing?

The Irish Times piece I think you are referring to is re-reporting of a FT piece, but all he says that I can see is this:

James Kenny wrote:

“The binding constraint in Ireland isn’t really around the supply of qualified people; it’s around infrastructure — the infrastructure in the city, the supply of housing . . . the capacity in the school system, the domestic transport infrastructure,”

boobycharlton · 18-05-2017 9:04pm

coylemj wrote: »

Fine, let them feck off to Paris or Frankfurt.

Seriously, the housing market here is bad enough at the moment, imagine what the sudden influx of 1,000 or so bankers on massive salaries will do to it, we simply cannot absorb them, never mind what they think of our transport 'infrastructure'.

It's this attitude that contributes to us having crap infrastructure.

Also use a bit of common sense, if bankers "on massive salaries" can afford to live in exorbitantly priced housing in London, Dublin will be no problem. The housing crisis here isn't affecting rich folks.

tabbey · 18-05-2017 9:40pm

Phoebas wrote: »

They are coming to Dublin - just bought a building that can hold 1000 staff.
.

If you read the article, 1000 is the potential workers in all three blocks. JPM only took one block, for up to 500.

Khuitlio · 18-05-2017 9:57pm

tabbey wrote: »

If you read the article, 1000 is the potential workers in all three blocks. JPM only took one block, for up to 500.

Actually the building they bought is for 1,000 employees. They currently employee 500 so could hire up to 500 more.

Phoebas · 18-05-2017 10:12pm

Khuitlio wrote: »

Actually the building they bought is for 1,000 employees. They currently employee 500 so could hire up to 500 more.

According to the developers, in the block they bought, each floor has capacity for between 122 and 196 workspaces and there are 7 office floors above ground, so 1000 should easily be doable.

n97 mini · 18-05-2017 10:12pm

Hollister11 wrote: »

10 minute DARTS were due a year ago, and still aren't here due to driver strikes. That's laughable, a company being held back because the workers aren't happy.

Sack them. It's a pretty good job, there will be plenty of takers.

10 minute *off peak* DARTs benefit very little. We have city centre stations with off peak services hourly (Drumcondra) or closed entirely (Docklands). We need a network of electrified trains, not one North-South line.

jimmycrackcorm · 18-05-2017 10:41pm

You mean 1000 well paid taxpayers to contribute to paying for social housing?

I don't blame them giving out about the infrastructure. I got the bus in this morning, almost a half hour crawling along the quays. Ban private cars on the quays from 7 am till 9:30 would do wonders for pubic transport.

Hotblack Desiato · 19-05-2017 12:11am

bk wrote: »

Brexit is going to hurt our economy greatly. We had a golden opportunity to become the alternative to London post Brexit and limit some of that damage. But no unfortunately too much small mindedness will continue to hold us back.

Such as that 'we need a counterpoint to Dublin, it's too big' nonsense. Dublin is the engine of the economy of the whole country.

Many of these people are still living under the delusion that their taxes fund Dublin when quite the opposite is true.

We should somewhat increase property taxes in Dublin but keep every single cent for infrastructure spending in the greater Dublin area with a mayor and GDA authority to oversee it. What the rest of the country needs to realise is that what is good for Dublin is good for Ireland and get over their Dublin envy. There can only be one capital city and every country has one.

Growth in employment in Dublin, especially high wage employment, will yield great economic benefits through taxes to the country as a whole, and the infrastructure needed to facilitate this will pay for itself many times over.

n97 mini · 19-05-2017 9:56am

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

We should somewhat increase property taxes in Dublin

Dublin already has the highest property taxes in Ireland. Maybe it'd be better to increase property taxes in places like Donegal, among the lowest in Ireland and receiving transfers from Dublin, so that more of Dublin's property taxes could stay in Dublin.

bk · 19-05-2017 9:59am

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Such as that 'we need a counterpoint to Dublin, it's too big' nonsense. Dublin is the engine of the economy of the whole country.

Yup, Dublin isn't competing with Cork, Limerick, etc. it is competing with London, Frankfurt, New York, San Francisco, etc.

It is competing to win the biggest companies and the smartest employees.

That isn't to say that Cork, Limerick, etc. shouldn't get investment too, they should. But they just have to be realistic about the type of investment and focus on different industries then Dublin, for instance Cork and the pharmaceutical industry.

Keyzer · 19-05-2017 10:40am

bk wrote: »

I've long be saying this. We are far too small minded in this country.

We have many great natural advantages:
- English speaking
- Lots of well educated people
- Generally very good reputation around the world, people like the idea of coming here to work (at least until they look into the details of housing, transport, etc.)
- Business friendly government

But we then totally shot ourselves in the foot by not offering the infrastructure that such companies and their employees require:

- Lots of very tall office buildings in the same location
- Lots of very tall apartment buildings near them, with quality but affordable apartments for their employess.
- Medium density (6 to 8 storeys) through out the rest of the city, with decent, affordable, quality apartments in them.
- High quality public transport throughout the city, to make fast and easy to get around (Metros, Darts, trams, high quality bus services), oh and at least the core network running 24/7
- High quality bike paths and bike infrastructure.
- Modern, non religious schools near by (remember many of the foreigners who come here aren't Catholic or religious at all and don't want to put up with the bs catholic education system here).

Brexit is going to hurt our economy greatly. We had a golden opportunity to become the alternative to London post Brexit and limit some of that damage. But no unfortunately too much small mindedness will continue to hold us back.

Couldn't agree more with this post. The lack of foresight and capacity planning in this country, especially when it comes to Dublin given its the capital city, is beyond astounding.

The capital city is, in my eyes, 20 years behind the pace in terms of transport, housing, schools etc.

BlinkingLights · 19-05-2017 11:03am

Well we've failed to ever invest in proper public transport in Dublin and we look like we are about to repeat the same issue in Cork.

Compare like with like here:

For example Dublin vs Brussels as locations. Dublin isn't really comparable to Paris, London or New York in terms of scale at all.

Brussels has four metro lines and a really good semi-underground modern tram network called the "pre-metro" with a further three lines. On top of that it has overground trams and busses reaching everywhere. You've also got 8 heavy rail train lines that include local and long distance computer train. You also have long-established and very advanced integrated ticketing system now run on contactless cards called Mobib. It is far more tied together than Leap.

Dublin has two overground trams and a coastal electric railway and a few infrequent commuter lines operated by diesel trains, with the vast majority of suburbs having no no rail. The bus network is dense, but it's nothing amazing.

Dublin has better air connectivity, but Brussels has high speed continental train connections.

Housing:

Dublin - expensive and in the rental sector, poor supply and bad quality.

Brussels - not cheap, but has good quality houses. In the rental side of things the market is far more regulated and there are plenty of very high quality, reasonable apartments and houses available at rent that isn't backbreaking. It's a far more regulated and established rental market. You can find everything from very short term term lets (furnished) and aimed at business people, furnished 1 year leases to unfurnished longer leases that are aimed at people who may want to stay for more than a few years, or permanently.

Social life : similar - both are very full of vibrant bars, have good arts and cultural scenes and have similar scale of museums and public galleries and attract similar levels of gigs.

Office accommodation:

Brussels probably has more sitting ready to go than Dublin has.

What's hampering Dublin has been lack of state vision for public transport for decades. These aren't projects you just do in a single government term. You need to be working 30+ years out. Brussels does that, Dublin doesn't.
Part of that is attitudinal - we never really spent on proper public transit infrastructure here and part of it is economic, Ireland was not a wealthy country in the mid-20th century running up to the 80s whereas Belgium and most continental countries and the UK come from a much more economically solid foundation. Ireland is relatively nouveau riche

Irish planners also tend to benchmark against the UK and New Zealand and other places that are English speaking and in many cases those places are very poor at planning and transit too. Shortermism and neoliberal economics having been the main driving forces for the past few decades in much of the English speaking world.

Then you've the housing crisis which is largely caused by a combination of poor planning and the financial system crash in 2008/9. We were building huge numbers of houses and apartments and went from a situation where we were meeting demand to one where we just had the whole system fall over and all construction stop. That's why there's a housing and homelessness issues in Dublin, Cork etc. The fact that houses were built in places that nobody wanted to live - remote rural housing estates etc and may never have real value is another issue entirely but they are often just conflated together and.

Ireland's currently not meeting housing demand and urgently needs to get investment in.

If there's huge demand in Dublin, you would think that it would be bringing large multinational property developers in to meet it if the local ones aren't capable of doing so. So, there's clearly something restricting that from happening right now. A serious lack of vision on allowing large scale, architecturally attractive developments seems to be a major stabling block. We have everything setup to facilitate people flipping old residential houses into apartments, small time developers and so on and a paranoia about high rise.

Even Cork seems to be prepared to go higher rise and denser in a way that Dublin isn't.

I'm not saying that Dublin won't land some investments, it certainly will and has a lot of selling points in terms of business culture, language and legal system similarities to the UK that put it at huge advantage.

We also need to avoid repeating the same mistakes in Cork in particular, but also Galway, Limerick and Waterford.

Realistically, Dublin should have at least a couple of metro lines (and they should have gone in back in the first boom) and several Luas lines - most big suburbs should at least have a Luas perhaps connecting to an underground central station.

Cork at this stage should at least have a Luas-type tram serving Carrigaline and Balincollig and they should have put in electric light rail to Midleton, Cobh etc (probably a modern tramway system.

We keep going with the crappy short term view and using diesel trains on commuter routes instead of just running some wires and taking advantage of environmentally friendly wind power etc etc to drive them

We'll never get our eco footprint down doing what we're doing.

On public transport in particular, we have to stop thinking short term and small.

Sebastian Dangerfield · 19-05-2017 11:09am

Phoebas wrote: »

They are coming to Dublin - just bought a building that can hold 1000 staff.

Whatever they think about the infrastructure, JP Morgan think we can absorb them.

As far as I know they are bringing just their fund servicing business - Custody, Admin, Depositary. All of the asset management is going elsewhere.

Ted Plain · 19-05-2017 11:11am

ClovenHoof wrote: »

Says it'll be the main reason why Dublin will probably lose out on the bulk of Brexit relocations.

Wonder if the "buses are enough", "Dublin too small for a metro!" ..and Ciarian Cuffe "western rail corridor comes first" are happy now.

"The buses are enough" say those who never take them themselves.

Phoebas · 19-05-2017 11:16am

Jordy Verrill wrote: »

"The buses are enough" say those who never take them themselves.

Exactly who said "The buses are enough"? An actual person or an invented caricature?

Cookie_Monster · 19-05-2017 11:26am

BlinkingLights wrote: »

Well we've failed to ever invest in proper public transport in Dublin

This is actually not true and only makes it worse. Dublin had a world leading tram network back in the day. Then someone though a bus was better and it all disappeared.

Keyzer · 19-05-2017 11:44am

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

This is actually not true and only makes it worse. Dublin had a world leading tram network back in the day. Then someone though a bus was better and it all disappeared.

You're talking about a tram system from 70 years ago. Buses, at the time, we're an improvement on the old tram system.

Massive investment in the transport infrastructure is required in Dublin and the country as whole. Our rail system in Dublin is beyond a joke with a huge choke-point between Connolly - Tara - Pearse.

Trains from Maynooth still stop (for a significant amount of time) or slow down on approach to Connolly in the morning due to capacity issues. This has been going on since I first began travelling into the city for work over 20 years ago.

Regardless of the government in charge, Dublin and the country as whole, needs a strategic 20-30 year plan to progressively improve our infrastructure. If we don't get our sh1t together soon we'll regret it for generations to come.

lawred2 · 19-05-2017 11:46am

coylemj wrote: »

Fine, let them feck off to Paris or Frankfurt.

Seriously, the housing market here is bad enough at the moment, imagine what the sudden influx of 1,000 or so bankers on massive salaries will do to it, we simply cannot absorb them, never mind what they think of our transport 'infrastructure'.

yeah because rich bankers have always been known to compete hard for 3 bed semis in Dublin 15

absolutely ridiculous backwards point of view to hold

Del.Monte · 19-05-2017 12:04pm

lawred2 wrote: »

yeah because rich bankers have always been known to compete hard for 3 bed semis in Dublin 15

absolutely ridiculous backwards point of view to hold

What about the cascade effect or do you think that there are 1,000 'rich banker stye' houses/apartments waiting for them to move into? Of course it would affect the housing market.

lawred2 · 19-05-2017 12:09pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

What about the cascade effect or do you think that there are 1,000 'rich banker stye' houses/apartments waiting for them to move into? Of course it would affect the housing market.

well you'd better close down the city then...

only way to protect it from the scourge of workers

all these googles and facebooks had better clear off too what with their trouble making multinational workforces looking for places to live..

Maybe the problem is a dysfunctional society that treats developers who provide these resources as scoundrels..

bk · 19-05-2017 12:59pm

Keyzer wrote: »

Regardless of the government in charge, Dublin and the country as whole, needs a strategic 20-30 year plan to progressively improve our infrastructure. If we don't get our sh1t together soon we'll regret it for generations to come.

We have no shortage of such plans. We are really good at producing excellent plans. It is actually executing on the plans that is the problem.

AlekSmart · 19-05-2017 1:08pm

bk wrote: »

We have no shortage of such plans. We are really good at producing excellent plans. It is actually executing on the plans that is the problem.

This is the nub of the issue.

As with Senor Melis of Madrid Metro fame,we have no issue inviting or contracting with the very best of the best in every field,however we then tend to laugh behind their backs,and send them packing with a hearty guffaw...."sure don't WE know what's best for ourselves ?"

Let us hold our breath (again) until Jarrett Walker manages to review our entire network,and recommend his preferred changes in record time before we get too downhearted.

However,with a form of election fever now once again in the air,I am not too hopeful of anything too radical emerging from the process.

n97 mini · 19-05-2017 1:39pm

Del.Monte wrote: »

What about the cascade effect or do you think that there are 1,000 'rich banker stye' houses/apartments waiting for them to move into? Of course it would affect the housing market.

Dublin needs to go high rise. I think the dogs in the streets know it at this stage. It's starting to happen, just about.

The solution to the housing shortage in Dublin isn't building 3000 houses in Celbridge (as currently planned); it's to build in Dublin, but to build up.

In the news yesterday is that the Irish Glass bottle site will contain 30% social housing in apartments (900 out of 3500) up to 16 stories. I wonder how that will work. Also I really think 16 stories is the lower end of the ambition scale.

lawred2 · 19-05-2017 1:41pm

n97 mini wrote: »

Dublin needs to go high rise. I think the dogs in the streets know it at this stage. It's starting to happen, just about.

The solution to the housing shortage in Dublin isn't building 3000 houses in Celbridge (as currently planned); it's to build in Dublin, but to build up.

In the news yesterday is that the Irish Glass bottle site will contain 30% social housing in apartments (900 out of 3500) up to 16 stories. I wonder how that will work. Also I really think 16 stories is the lower end of the ambition scale.

yes - but it's a welcome start and the DCC dinosaurs won't change quickly. It's going to take a while..

n97 mini · 19-05-2017 1:50pm

lawred2 wrote: »

yes - but it's a welcome start and the DCC dinosaurs won't change quickly. It's going to take a while..

The problem is once you build on the site there's no going back. The IFSC is almost uniformly 8 storeys. That's a huge opportunity lost.

lawred2 · 19-05-2017 1:53pm

n97 mini wrote: »

The problem is once you build on the site there's no going back. The IFSC is almost uniformly 8 storeys. That's a huge opportunity lost.

still a huge amount of undeveloped land around the IFSC

wordofwarning · 19-05-2017 1:58pm

n97 mini wrote: »

The problem is once you build on the site there's no going back. The IFSC is almost uniformly 8 storeys. That's a huge opportunity lost.

There is huge amounts of industrial land in Dublin really close to the City. A lot of Glasnevin, Finglas, Ballyfermot, Cabra, Broombridge are less than 4 kms to the city and could be redeveloped into apartments at some stage. There is ton of land that could utilised still

Jobs OXO · 19-05-2017 1:59pm

ClovenHoof wrote: »

But he said in the Times business section that it won't be a trend as Dublin comes out very poor in surveys for no metro. JP will be the exception. Not the rule.

I can only imagine the typical Irish business gob****e still acting and looking like Arthur Daley taking his cigar out while listening to this going "wha?"

You seem very angry about something ? Why the disparaging remarks ? Have you been sacked or something ?

daheff · 19-05-2017 2:01pm

Phoebas wrote: »

They are coming to Dublin - just bought a building that can hold 1000 staff.

Whatever they think about the infrastructure, JP Morgan think we can absorb them.

JPM have (at least) 2 other sites in dublin -one in IFSC and one in Malahide. The office purchase is to house these into one spot, and expand somewhat. I dont see 1k new jobs out of this.

jimmycrackcorm wrote: »

You mean 1000 well paid taxpayers to contribute to paying for social housing?

I don't blame them giving out about the infrastructure. I got the bus in this morning, almost a half hour crawling asking the quays. Ban private cars on the quays from 7 am till 9:30 would do wonders for pubic transport.

Banning private cars would be a disaster. A lot of people do not have any other choice but to drive to work because we have a piss poor public transport system. We need to have new transport network capacity beforewe can even think about reducing the transport capacity thats already there. Otherwise -if you think things are bad now they'll be disasterous then. The DART was revolutionary at its time as it predominantly used existing railtrack and did not take up roadspace. Luas, while good, has used up road space. Taking away more roadspace without significant added public transport capacity would be crazy (think of how many cars sit in traffic along one lane of the quays. To replace them you need to add that capacity to multiple (and in a lot of cases) new commuting lines.....and at a reasonable frequency and cost. Can't see us being able to do that.

bk wrote: »

We have no shortage of such plans. We are really good at producing excellent plans. It is actually executing on the plans that is the problem.

No- the problem is we don't have the money to execute these plans.

n97 mini · 19-05-2017 2:05pm

wordofwarning wrote: »

There is huge amounts of industrial land in Dublin really close to the City. A lot of Glasnevin, Finglas, Ballyfermot, Cabra, Broombridge are less than 4 kms to the city and could be redeveloped into apartments at some stage. There is ton of land that could utilised still

The issue is that there has to be balance. We can't build apartments on every square inch of land in Dublin. Streets need to be developed so that shops, bars and restaurants as well as things like public recreation centres, libraries, cinemas, auditoriums etc need to also go in. And in a way that they can develop mostly organically. Having one planned bar that has a monopoly in an area (and is usually owned by a certain wealthy pub owner who owns 30 odd pubs already) is a feature of modern built Dublin that I detest. This is my fear with the rush to build apartments.

lawred2 · 19-05-2017 2:16pm

daheff wrote: »

Banning private cars would be a disaster....

Oh no... not this again

bk · 19-05-2017 2:23pm

daheff wrote: »

Banning private cars would be a disaster. A lot of people do not have any other choice but to drive to work because we have a piss poor public transport system.

No, it is a chicken and egg problem. We have piss poor public transport because too much road space is given too cars and not enough space and priority given to buses and trams.

Reduce the cars and give more space to the above and public transport greatly improves.

daheff wrote: »

No- the problem is we don't have the money to execute these plans.

You mean too much money given to social services, public sector employee pay and tax cuts, leaving nothing for infrastructure investment. It is all about priorities.

Ironically the better the infrastructure you have, the more high paying, high tax jobs you can attract here, which leads to more tax take and thus money money available for all of the above. But then we tend to be too short sighted for that.

ancapailldorcha · 19-05-2017 2:31pm

bk wrote: »

Ironically the better the infrastructure you have, the more high paying, high tax jobs you can attract here, which leads to more tax take and thus money money available for all of the above. But then we tend to be too short sighted for that.

To add to the irony, building said infrastructure would create several good jobs in the short term.

wordofwarning · 19-05-2017 2:44pm

n97 mini wrote: »

The issue is that there has to be balance. We can't build apartments on every square inch of land in Dublin. Streets need to be developed so that shops, bars and restaurants as well as things like public recreation centres, libraries, cinemas, auditoriums etc need to also go in. And in a way that they can develop mostly organically. Having one planned bar that has a monopoly in an area (and is usually owned by a certain wealthy pub owner who owns 30 odd pubs already) is a feature of modern built Dublin that I detest. This is my fear with the rush to build apartments.

I roll my eyes I every time I hear of the lack of services in Dublin. The lack of parks etc. Dublin has to be one of the greenest European Cities I have ever been. There is so many parks, greens, square. Right on the edge of the city centre is the Phoenix Park. Yet some people seem to think Dublin is a concrete jungle. In fact Dublin has 78 sq meters of green space per person. I know it hard to believe the Phoenix Park is a park, as it is generally used as a shortcut to work for thousands of Dubliners

http://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/content/YourCouncil/CouncilPublications/Documents/SustainabilityReport2013.pdf

Modern developments in Dublin lack libraries, recreation centres etc as they are basically only seen as needed in working class areas of Dublin. Not a single DCC owned sports centre is in a middle class area bar Rathmines. Nearly all the libraries are in working class areas (although a lot of them were built in 1930s). DCC does not like providing services to middle class areas.

We need to stop the modern development of Dublin need to a lack of bar diversity? Are you serious? It is the most bizarre excuse I have heard yet

end of the road · 19-05-2017 3:07pm

wordofwarning wrote: »

We need to stop the modern development of Dublin need to a lack of bar diversity? Are you serious? It is the most bizarre excuse I have heard yet

absolutely. diversity in terms of shops and other services is vital to insure people are attracted to living in these new developments. people don't want the same old that they can get elsewhere.

magicbastarder · 19-05-2017 3:51pm

wordofwarning wrote: »

Nearly all the libraries are in working class areas (although a lot of them were built in 1930s).

an aside, but i know a few people who worked in DCC libraries. Dalkey was considered a punishment posting, due to the sheer rudeness of the clientele.

on a more serious note though, i would say that if you had limited resources to provide library services, it'd be erring on the side of caution to favour more economically depressed areas.

markpb · 19-05-2017 4:39pm

daheff wrote: »

We need to have new transport network capacity beforewe can even think about reducing the transport capacity thats already there.

Changing a lane of a road to a bus lane immediately increases the capacity of that road. Even changing it to a cycle lane increases the capacity. Basically, everything short of converting lanes into urbans farms mean that more people can benefit from it. If you want to increase public transport capacity without affecting road capacity, the only option is underground and if you think it's possible to build an underground rail line without affecting traffic in the city centre, you're smoking something you shouldn't be!

Luas, while good, has used up road space. Taking away more roadspace without significant added public transport capacity would be crazy (think of how many cars sit in traffic along one lane of the quays. To replace them you need to add that capacity to multiple (and in a lot of cases) new commuting lines.....and at a reasonable frequency and cost. Can't see us being able to do that.

Approximately 400 cars drive along the quays at rush hour. That's means those two lanes are carrying about the same as 5 buses or 2 trams. Giving road space from cars to buses or trams is an increase in capacity.

No- the problem is we don't have the money to execute these plans.

That's not true either. This year the government expect to spend €53 billion. The entire budget for Metro North was only €2 billion and would have been paid over about 8 years or €250 million per year. That's just 0.4% of the budget. The budget for Luas Cross City was only a paltry €350 million and was paid over five years or 0.1% of the budget per year. We choose not to spend that money on transport.

n97 mini · 19-05-2017 4:40pm

wordofwarning wrote: »

I roll my eyes I every time I hear of the lack of services in Dublin. The lack of parks etc. Dublin has to be one of the greenest European Cities I have ever been. There is so many parks, greens, square. Right on the edge of the city centre is the Phoenix Park. Yet some people seem to think Dublin is a concrete jungle. In fact Dublin has 78 sq meters of green space per person. I know it hard to believe the Phoenix Park is a park, as it is generally used as a shortcut to work for thousands of Dubliners

http://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/content/YourCouncil/CouncilPublications/Documents/SustainabilityReport2013.pdf

Modern developments in Dublin lack libraries, recreation centres etc as they are basically only seen as needed in working class areas of Dublin. Not a single DCC owned sports centre is in a middle class area bar Rathmines. Nearly all the libraries are in working class areas (although a lot of them were built in 1930s). DCC does not like providing services to middle class areas.

We need to stop the modern development of Dublin need to a lack of bar diversity? Are you serious? It is the most bizarre excuse I have heard yet

I never mentioned parks, you did. Though Phoenix park probably skews the average per person considerably.

I'm talking solely about the built environment. If you want to see monuments to bad planning just look in the suburbs. Places like Palmerstown south of the N4. Thousands of houses, one pub in the middle, or around Pennyhill in Lucan..., same story. Dublin 15... Clonsilla, Roselawn, Huntstown, Little pace. As well as the one pub there is usually a Spar or a Lidl. There are no commercial/retail streets.

You can build high-rise and still keep the ground levels free for commercial uses.

bk · 19-05-2017 4:42pm

wordofwarning wrote: »

I roll my eyes I every time I hear of the lack of services in Dublin. The lack of parks etc. Dublin has to be one of the greenest European Cities I have ever been. There is so many parks, greens, square.

I agree that Dublin has many amazing parks right on our doorstep and then the amazing amenity of the Dublin and Wicklow mountains so close by.

I visit all of the above frequently and I love them and I'm always amazed at how few Irish people are visiting them! We seem to take for granted the fantastic facilities we have right here.

However is some ways they are quiet underdeveloped.

Phoenix Park is massive, but not serviced by any public transport beyond expensive tourist buses.

It has one small cafe next to the zoo that stupidly closes at 5, even when the park if open, bright and lovely until 10pm. There should be dozens of restaurants and cafes throughout the park and open till late.

There should be more organised events happening in the park, small concerts, outdoor film screenings, etc.

It is a very underutilised resource.

Oh and don't get me started on the lovely Botanic Gardens that closes at 5:30 every day, stupidity of the highest!!

As for Wicklow, the government should really be buying the Guinness Estate and turning it into a Glendalough mark 2. There should really be far more developed walks around Wicklow and the Dublin Mountains.

And there should be small cheap mini buses running between the various trail heads and back to Bray/Dublin.

The problem though, is that while we have these lovely parks, they are slightly out of the way and somewhat inaccessible. Meanwhile, when we build apartments and houses, we do so without adequate green areas and playgrounds next to them. Which is probably why many people feel like there isn't much greenery in Dublin, because their isn't near their homes.

When we build big tall apartment buildings, we really need to be putting shops, coffee shops, butchers, gyms, etc. in the first floor or two of them.

And likewise even in old buildings which are normally 3 storeys, we need to be increasing them to 6 or 7 storeys (tastefully), while putting a selection of nice shops, little bars, little butchers, etc. like you see in cities like Barcelona, where you literally don't need to walk more then one block to get all the normal services you would expect.

We really do still have a long way to go to learn how to build and live in cities.

JP Morgan Boss Slams Dublin Transport Infrastructure

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