Re: Re: Urban Sprawl destorying economy

Themond Park – I’m sure we’re pretty much of a similar mind here though I take issue with both yourself and DublinLimrick with regard to South London. I’ve lived in London nearly ten years now with the last four or so in South London. Its certainly a bit messy but in no way an urban wasteland. I actullay live in Brixton which is one of the most vibrant, culturally mixed, cultural, fun, well-connected, green and leafy inner suburbs one could wish to live in. Similar could be said of ten’s of other such urban villages that South Londoners call home. I’m not suggesting that Ireland and London are equivalent just that it is possible to house considerable populations in relative urban luxury at medium densities – London is in no way a high density city like Paris or Barcellona.

DublinLimrick – You do not seem to have read my submission above. I make no comparions in my piece at all – just the singular observation that we’ve got a lot of space and not very many people who collectively live in a disjointed and unsustainable manner. How this suggests a “rather geographically ( and perhaps culturally ) restricted knowledge” I do not know. To date I have lived in Dublin, London, Sydney, Melbourne and Boston for extensive periods of time. I do agree that London is not, cannot and should not be a model for Dublin in the round but there are valuable lessons that can be learnt from this city. (Dave – London’s population is increasing and has been for about a decade. While the official population is about 7.5 million this does not take into consideration the green belt which artifically – but positively – confines the popluation figures). Certainly there are much more appropriate models as you noted.

This is both a cultural (manstein) and infrastructural issue (dave123) in addition to the architecture or not of the developments in question. Leaving this to the market is proving a disaster.