Reply To: Spencer dock development

Exactly, there are always trade-offs if you want the conveniences of city living – except it seems in Ireland. Here they seem to be quite keen on covering the entire country in concrete just so they can appease some nimby protestors who don’t want their kitchen window “overshadowed” or whatever the latest buzzword is.

Just look at London, a city with a similar climate, hours of sunshine and all the rest as Dublin, the general height and bulk of buildings there is far greater than it is in Dublin (and they mostly look good too) yet most people I’ve heard seem to love the place architecturally and I’m not talking about Canary Wharf sized developments either.

The fact is that whats going on in the Dublin docklands right now could pass for developments in Grimsby or Swansea or Stoke-on-trent or some other such backwater in England. Do we want to aspire to be more like London or more like the places I just mentioned? Apparently the DDDA want the latter – if only they could be removed from power – even An Bord Pleanala seem to be gradually being dragged kicking and screaming out of the 19th century if their permission for the Tara Street building is anything to go by.