Academy St Development

A contribution: **new** street emerges

but like Dunnes, for one good side street we get this on the other side

actually that last post might be Dunnes… ooops!

apartments apartments apartments

Patrick St presence surprisingly minor. Must. Assemble. More. Sites. Next. Time 😉

Academy St itself…

Maybe its the beautiful weather but that doesn’t look too bad. The scale seems appropriate and it knits into the existing fabric reasonably well. It’ll be interesting to see it finished. Thanks for the pics.

Thanks for the images.

It seems to be coming together nicely. I think, once the Patrick Street facade emerges, we’ll see that it was a mistake to remove the old Examiner Office building. It’ll be great to view the Crawford through ( a now widened ) Faulkner’s Lane.
The Patrick Street side of Dunnes looks impressive, but the side streets and rear of the Dunnes development is shaping up to be predictably awful. Activity on these streets is going to be limited given the lack of shopfronts.

@Radioactiveman wrote:

the side streets and rear of the Dunnes development is shaping up to be predictably awful. Activity on these streets is going to be limited given the lack of shopfronts.

Was that inevitable given the increased space given to Faulkers Lane? (ie they weren’t going to give up floorspace/footprint if they could avoid it?!) And will the miserable side street be used as service entrances etc, which do need to be dealt with somewhere?

@Radioactiveman wrote:

Thanks for the images.

It seems to be coming together nicely. I think, once the Patrick Street facade emerges, we’ll see that it was a mistake to remove the old Examiner Office building. It’ll be great to view the Crawford through ( a now widened ) Faulkner’s Lane.
The Patrick Street side of Dunnes looks impressive, but the side streets and rear of the Dunnes development is shaping up to be predictably awful. Activity on these streets is going to be limited given the lack of shopfronts.

Should all those streets as far as the river now be pedestrianised apart from deliveries.They are quite narrow and limited parking.It would really improve that part of the city.The lane between the new Dunnes and The Savoy seems like a lost opportunity to get some life and light into that lane.

Whats the word on occupants?
H&M along with Topshop/Topman are signed up. I heard rumours of HMV moving from Patrick Street.
Any other ideas?

@Radioactiveman wrote:

I heard rumours of HMV moving from Patrick Street.

I heard HMV could well be moving from their current premises, but the old Virgin Megastore was the rumoured destination.

Much of the scaffolding and hoarding has now been removed from the Patrick Street facade. It makes Le Chateau look ridiculous, especially the stone steps to the first floor. The interaction of this new development with old at this particular location is an absolute failure.

@Radioactiveman wrote:

Much of the scaffolding and hoarding has now been removed from the Patrick Street facade. It makes Le Chateau look ridiculous, especially the stone steps to the first floor. The interaction of this new development with old at this particular location is an absolute failure.

Typical. Any photos?

Re: the green and red tiled facade on academy street, was that always there? it’s very pretty

The tiled bit was always there.

I’m trying to recall what it used to be like. If I’m correct, the windows directly above the tiled are were there before the development too, but I think the floor above that has been added.

you know i’m really looking forward to seeing the Patrick St facade, does anyone have a render of what it’s to look like?

also, are there any shop fronts facing the opera house/lane side? if not thats a massive shame, all those smaller alleys have the potential to be another french church st or better. the last thing we want to do is, well, firstly homogenise our city blocks, but secondly orientate those milk cartons solely to the widest street available. this. is. not. a. grid. city.
.

Render…

to be fair in that particular render it looks all right, a bit flash but hey.

From today’s Examiner:

International fashion chain H&M are to be one of the key retailers in Cork city centre’s almost completed €500 million Opera Lane development.
In a welcome jobs boost to the city, 100 to 150 jobs are expected to be provided in the store which will open in late autumn.

H&M’s long-anticipated arrival will be seen as a boost to the O’Callaghan Properties development on St Patrick’s Street, where identities of new traders have been expected since late last year. The collapse in the retail economy has, however, seen negotiations drag out over a longer than expected period.

H&M’s confirmed arrival to a 27,000sq ft unit at the corner of Academy Street/Emmet Place is expected to trigger several other completed signings from traders keen to ally themselves to such a strong international brand.

Financial director of O’Callaghan Properties Brian O’Callaghan described the development as “great news for the project, and for Cork.”

He went on: “It is a big marquee brand and its arrival is a ringing endorsement of the scheme. We are looking forward to announcing other major names in the coming weeks.”

An OCP spokesperson said that Opera Lane (the original name Opera Avenue has been amended) was 75% let or in advanced legals, and the adjacent Half Moon Street development had 60% of its retail space negotiated, via letting agents Savills.

Swedish-based fashion retailer H&M has more than 1,800 stores worldwide, in over 34 markets, and has 10 outlets already in Ireland, primarily in and around Dublin, but also in Limerick and Athlone.

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Good to see they’ve taken our advice and dropped the pretentious ‘Avenue’ from the title.

http://www.operaavenue.ie

http://www.operalane.com

No chance to see it… Is it like the render version?

As expected, NEXT have confirmed as tenants in the Academy Street/Faulkner’s Lane development. Presumably this will lead them to vacate their cramped Merchants Quay store.

@Radioactiveman wrote:

As expected, NEXT have confirmed as tenants in the Academy Street/Faulkner’s Lane development. Presumably this will lead them to vacate their cramped Merchants Quay store.

Merchant Quay has a good few empty units allready.

Time to re-develop that awful mall and Quay facade ?

@Cliff Barnes wrote:

Merchant Quay has a good few empty units allready.

Time to re-develop that awful mall and Quay facade ?

Yes ! Not likely though ?

@Peter Fitz wrote:

Yes ! Not likely though ?

This isn’t really the thread for it, but remember Dunnes may not want to stay put in MQ given their new store on Patrick Street. There was talk a few years back of putting another floor on. Perhaps now is the time for a major re-furb. Remember, the place was built in the midst of the last recession, so its not like OCP don’t have the nerve.

http://www.operalane.com

http://www.operaavenue.ie

The website for this development is now up and running. Some nice images, virtual walk-throughs, etc. for perusing.

A number of (relatively) minor points still trouble me:

1. The website mentions both Opera Lane and Faulkner’s Lane and in one of the onscreen maps refers to the lane itself as Opera Lane. Can we get this clear? There is no such street in Cork City as Opera Lane. Call the buildings what you want but leave the street names alone.

2. When the former Examiner Facade to Patrick Street was demolished to make way for the glazed structure, the planning permission required the distinctive doorway was to be retained for future use ON-SITE. When/where is this going to happen?

3. Finally (and longtime readers of the Cork threads will, like me, be feeling a sense of Deja Vu) where is the Echo-boy? He used to be at the top of Faulkner’s Lane. Presumably he is to be re-instated?

@Radioactiveman wrote:

This isn’t really the thread for it, but remember Dunnes may not want to stay put in MQ given their new store on Patrick Street. There was talk a few years back of putting another floor on. Perhaps now is the time for a major re-furb. Remember, the place was built in the midst of the last recession, so its not like OCP don’t have the nerve.

Do we need 4+ lanes of traffic on Patricks Quay going into 1 lane on a mostly pedestrianised Patrick Street now that the centre core is bypassed ?

Give 2 lanes back to the developer to extend centre to original footprint of original buildings ?

New facade and extra floor space for larger units is possible.

Its dying a slow death on the mall side and with Opera Avenue etc thats wher the footfall is going to be.

Upstairs in Merchant’s Quay is like a ghost town.

I’ll go back to what I’ve said before, but there aren’t enough cinema screens in the city centre and upstairs in an underused shopping centre is not a bad place to put one. Regardless of whether it’s a cinema or not, in general an entertainment rather than retail use might be a better idea.

Although, ideally, it would be ripped apart and the river frontage rebuilt.

I’m not a fan of the pastiche frontage onto Pana, but it’s not hugely offensive. The same can’t be said for the frontage on the river side.

@Cliff Barnes wrote:

Do we need 4+ lanes of traffic on Patricks Quay going into 1 lane on a mostly pedestrianised Patrick Street now that the centre core is bypassed ?

Give 2 lanes back to the developer to extend centre to original footprint of original buildings ?

New facade and extra floor space for larger units is possible.

Its dying a slow death on the mall side and with Opera Avenue etc thats wher the footfall is going to be.

That’s a nice idea in theory, but just not practical with the current traffic flow in the city. The inside lane is used primarily for waiting buses, and set down for cars and cabs outside the MQ entrance. Next two lanes are for north and west-bound traffic, continuing down the quays or turning onto Patricks bridge. The current street layout leaves only a few route options for any traffic heading north.

As for the centre core being bypassed, it doesn’t work that simply alas. If you try to go from the city centre to anywhere north, you pretty much have to cross either Christy Ring bridge, the North Gate bridge or Patricks bridge. Our narrow streets and bridges have limited capacity and any given afternoon/evening in Cork you’ll see traffic backed down the quays waiting to cross the river.

I’ve spent probably hours of my life stuck in traffic on the quays, or on Parnell place waiting to get through the lights, only for traffic to fail to budge for several successive light changes. I’d be totally against reducing any capacity on the quays until some real remedial measures are taken to improve traffic flow and access.

Any idea would the following work?

• Reorganise traffic lanes between the South Mall, Parnell place, Lapps Quay and Albert Quay to alter priority for northbound traffic out of the city towards the eastern bridges
• Put a single west-bound contra-flow bus lane on south mall
• Replace the chicane outside Argos with a bus gate
• Use the current laneway between Bridewell and Phillips site as a bus priority lane,
• extend right up to the North Gate bridge. Move traffic lanes away from river, using the crappy bit of tarmac (loading area) outside North Main street centre; widen quayside footpaths.
• Better traffic management and enforcement on Shandon street would allow northbound city busses to use this route, thus freeing up capacity on the central quays and allowing for a reduction in lanes and a more pleasant street frontage.

That’s just a top-of-my head idea, and no doubt there are plenty of flaws I haven’t thought of. How about a new thread to discuss ways to improve the city’s traffic flow and streetscape? Or is this too much of a tangent from architecture?

@bosco wrote:

That’s a nice idea in theory, but just not practical with the current traffic flow in the city. The inside lane is used primarily for waiting buses, and set down for cars and cabs outside the MQ entrance. Next two lanes are for north and west-bound traffic, continuing down the quays or turning onto Patricks bridge. The current street layout leaves only a few route options for any traffic heading north.

As for the centre core being bypassed, it doesn’t work that simply alas. If you try to go from the city centre to anywhere north, you pretty much have to cross either Christy Ring bridge, the North Gate bridge or Patricks bridge. Our narrow streets and bridges have limited capacity and any given afternoon/evening in Cork you’ll see traffic backed down the quays waiting to cross the river.

I’ve spent probably hours of my life stuck in traffic on the quays, or on Parnell place waiting to get through the lights, only for traffic to fail to budge for several successive light changes. I’d be totally against reducing any capacity on the quays until some real remedial measures are taken to improve traffic flow and access.

Any idea would the following work?

• Reorganise traffic lanes between the South Mall, Parnell place, Lapps Quay and Albert Quay to alter priority for northbound traffic out of the city towards the eastern bridges
• Put a single west-bound contra-flow bus lane on south mall
• Replace the chicane outside Argos with a bus gate
• Use the current laneway between Bridewell and Phillips site as a bus priority lane,
• extend right up to the North Gate bridge. Move traffic lanes away from river, using the crappy bit of tarmac (loading area) outside North Main street centre; widen quayside footpaths.
• Better traffic management and enforcement on Shandon street would allow northbound city busses to use this route, thus freeing up capacity on the central quays and allowing for a reduction in lanes and a more pleasant street frontage.

That’s just a top-of-my head idea, and no doubt there are plenty of flaws I haven’t thought of. How about a new thread to discuss ways to improve the city’s traffic flow and streetscape? Or is this too much of a tangent from architecture?

It worked fine for hundreds of years with 2 lanes and we even even had a tram system then.

Traffic should adapt to the city not the other way around.

The original footprint and vertical emphasis of the previous merchants quay grew organically and it worked until the whole lot was bought by a developer and left go to ruin which slowly but surely will ironically happen with M.Q.S.C. as more fashionable new centres open up.

Why do we have “waiting” buses in the first place taking up space,burning fuel ineffeciently and poisoning the public ?

The buses shoud keep moving.

Merchants Quay with its traffic dominated streetscape and awful waste that is the quay itself.

@Radioactiveman wrote:

3. Finally (and longtime readers of the Cork threads will, like me, be feeling a sense of Deja Vu) where is the Echo-boy? He used to be at the top of Faulkner’s Lane. Presumably he is to be re-instated?

Good to see that the Echoboy statue has been reinstated on Patrick Street.

GAP are taking 10,000 sq ft at Academy St

Was this officially opened today?

Developer ‘treated badly’ by NAMA
Thursday, 1 October 2009 17:05

Property developer Owen O’Callaghan has said he and other developers have been treated very badly in the establishment of the National Asset Management Agency.

Owen O’Callaghan, who developed the Liffey Valley Shopping Centre in Dublin, Mahon Point in Cork, and Arthur’s Quay in Limerick, said all of his loans were performing and there was absolutely no reason for him to have anything to do with NAMA.

However, he said, he and his company were being dragged into NAMA and were being given no say in the matter.

Mr O’Callaghan – one of the country’s biggest commercial and retail property developers – said he was kept in the dark on NAMA’s establishment and he felt he was being treated very badly.

He said he would much prefer to be left alone and have nothing to do with NAMA.

The developer was speaking in Cork at the opening of a new city centre development, Opera Lane, which covers 200,000sq.ft of retail space and which he valued at €500m.

He said the retailers locating in Opera Lane will employ more than 1,200 people.

I think H&M opened.

Not sure about the rest of the development.

It was on the RTE 9 o’clock news last night – the main focus was on O’Callaghan’s feelings about been unfairly treated by NAMA. It mentioned that H&M had opened. Other outlets looked like they were still in fitting out or reserved stage. The aerial views of the development looked really impressive.

H & M are open, Gap and Next are on the way (Next in mid-November, IIRC).

I believe the corner units (Faulkner’s Lane & Patrick St.) are reserved. I’ve heard vague, rumours that Apple are opening a store in the city centre; one of those units would seem ideal for that purpose (purely speculative!!).

Pity Faulkner’s Lane is now the dullest street in the city centre. Two dull, similarly styled shopping blocks running the length of the street. No attempt to have cafes/restaurants/bars to bring a bit of buzz to the lane; or any trees, lamps flower beds anything to provide a little variety. Disappointing.

The Evening Echo says that Apple are in advanced talks with Owen O’Callaghan to open a shop in Opera Lane. I think they might be taking the premises on the corner of Opera Lane and Patrick’s St next to the EBS. don’t know when they might open though.

Interesting confirmation about Apple!

Incidentally, I just read now on the ever-reliable (cough) peoplesrepublicofcork.com that the lane is being renamed to “Opera Avenue”. Puke. Still, nice to think the recession hasn’t stopped our representatives bending to the will of developers…

And also that the right of way is being extinguished – though from the wording on that site, it might just be that it’s being made one – way, from Patrick St. to Emmet Place. Does anyone know anything about this?

‘Opera Avenue’ was the original name of the development then it was changed to the less yuppie sounding ‘Opera Lane’.

I was reading in yesterdays Evening Echo that the council have voted narrowly in favour of renaming Faulkner’s Lane to Opera Lane (to promote the Opera house) but a commemorative plaque will be erected that will give reference to the original street name. (Whatever that means)

It’s a shame really Faulkner’s Lane sounded way cooler. 😎

EDIT: Crude photo showing headline. (The best I can do with my camera phone)

Thanks green jesus. (Never thought I’d be saying that sentence..)

Contrived names for the purposes of making developments never sound more trendy and up-market are rarely as interesting as the names which are set over time, reflecting something of the area’s history.

I noticed the Patrick St. end is now blocked off for traffic, I assume that’s what the right-of-way announcement was related to?

Either it’s very late on a Friday, or your camera phone isn’t the best 😉 but there is a story about talks on Pairc Ui Chaoimh too, do you know what those were about?

Worked on this development, in reference to a previos post, the windows above the decorative corball on the mosaic building are indeed new (new stair core to the aprtments now resides behing this facade, utilising the view thro these fantastic windows for every day use by residents, rather than just service stairs)..

The lane way between OCP dev and Dunnes had to be utilised mainly as a service street, given the space required for a car lift, the two sub stations required by the esb took up alot of retail frontage, plus allowances for access to switch rooms at -1 level, escape access for gentlemans quarters, access to the management suites, it just didnt leave much space for main retail frontage… Given the clutter of allocated service space, this strret looks very presentable. Having widened Faulkerers Lane.. aka Opera Avenue/Lane, (City Councillors get final approval on changing an existing street name), the widening of this lane was never financially feasable.

Its looking well..

@who_me wrote:

but there is a story about talks on Pairc Ui Chaoimh too, do you know what those were about?

It said the City Manager would meet with the Cork County GAA Board to discuss their plans to redevelop Pairc Ui Chaoimh.
The GAA say it is a major priority for them to proceed with it but no dates have been given for when applications will be lodged etc.