Re: Re: Carlton Cinema Development

Really really dreadful! I could go into more detail regarding its awfulness but I just can’t be bothered.

This whole process whereby developers prevaricate and Planning Authorities impose spurious “visual” conditions remind me of two previous blights on Dublins built fabric.

Firstly, The ILAC centre. The developers swept away a charming warren of streets only to get cold feet with the economy wobbling in the late 1970s. Their original urban scaled plans were dropped and we ended up with a single storey outer suburban strip mall plonked beside our capitals main street.

Secondly, after permitting and indeed participating in the wanton destruction of Georgian Dublin, the council insisted that all new buildings be in “Georgian style” pastiche crap! Short of a complete reconstruction a la what happened in Europe post WWII, they could have made the best of a bad situation and encouraged architects to experiment with modern architecture. But instead, architects were straight-jacketed to build only in redbrick, with uniform windows.

Both of these examples seem apt with the Carlton site. Nice to see we have learned from history!!

C