Re: Re: well what about the developments popping up in the shannonside ?

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December 18, 2007 at 10:42 pm #754666
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The Vision of a Revitalised Limerick

Peter Coyne / Edward Walsh

The Fundamental Vision

Arising from the 20 interviews with a selection of leading figures in the wider city area, a uniformity of expression was evident concerning the present state of the city and the fundamental or intuitive vision of its future:

What Urban Limerick Looks Like

  • Retail moving out to suburbs – retail values falling;

  • Nobody manages the entirety of the city: it’s divided up between 3 competing local authorities;

  • Depopulating and looking a bit derelict;

  • It’s going nowhere – even though it could be great;

  • Little development compared to other cities;

  • No joined up thinking – or doing;

  • Economy hanging on a shrinking base;

  • Three huge concentrations of inner city deprivation;

  • City centre dragged down by social and economic imbalance;

  • No heart to the city;

  • Absence of vibrancy and culture;

  • The river could be so much more;

  • Hardly any tourism – very little to attract them;

  • Business areas abandoned after work;

  • The bigger city has no leadership;

  • The city is not embraced by the people – they don’t own it;

  • Not even a cinema;

  • Terrible reputation for crime that’s probably undeserved but these things are self-fulfilling;

  • There is no vision

How Urban Limerick Should Look

  • A growing city for the region – could be a 250,000 metropolitan population;

  • A proper city with ambitious and accountable government with a can-do attitude;

  • A honeypot for inward investment – a counterbalance to the overheated east;

  • A bustling and exciting waterfront – an iconic heart to the city;

  • Vibrancy in the city centre – 18-24 hour city;

  • A critical mass of tourist attractions;

  • Family-friendly city with the homes and amenities that encourage people with economic choice to live in the city;

  • The retail centre for the region;

  • The university an inextricable element of the city brand – connecting socially and culturally with the city as well as economically,

  • New economic activities – a knowledge industry growth centre – renewed synergies with a growing 3rd and 4th level;

  • Excellent transportation infrastructure and interconnectivity with other Atlantic cities – people able to commute between them;

  • Docklands and King’s Island new and wonderful mixed use extensions to the city centre;

  • Several big civic pride icons – buildings and places to put us on the world stage;

  • Citizens taking pride and caring for their city;

  • Leadership;

  • A city known for arts and culture;

  • A city with a vision

I see in tonight’s Limerick Chronicle that the Fianna Fáil County Cllr. Eddie Wade feels threatened by this independent report where he said that he had hoped that the recent boundary extensions “would be the end of it”, and called on Dr Walsh and Mr Coyne to explain their proposals to County Councillors in person.

Maybe Cllr. Eddie Wade should explain to the Irish tax payers the economic logic of three local authorities administrating a city of 100.000 people? Or better still he should explain to their constituents in West Limerick as to why they are been off-loaded into North Kerry for future general elections? The Limerick County would had been better served by a central location of their county council offices in Newcastlewest , instead of planking it along side the Crescent Shopping Centre.

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