Dublin Public Realm Strategy

It looks temporary. On the upside it means that when the utilities come along and dig it up (which they will, and probably before long), they in theory should be able to patch it neatly

Jeremy Clarkson hasn’t branched out into urban design has he?

You wouldn’t usually think – formula one, pit-lane, aesthetic – when it comes to the public realm improvement and partial pedestrianization of a three hundred year old street.

If I was Joseph Fade, I would immediately begin haunting the individual responsible for this until he hands in a request to be transferred back down to Drainage Division, where he belongs.

Saw that Fade Street ‘improvement’ scheme when I was back in Dublin for xmas. Would be grateful for any updates on whether or not this is the finished scheme or whether it is temporary. That tarmac finish was looking recession-tastic :crazy:

Gone are the days I used to come home each year to see a new city block or landmark building on the horizon. This year was more about the calmness of the city and the empty shopfronts.

I notice that streetlighting is now being added (the modern catalogue style) so perhaps this remains a work in progress. It is feasible that a resin coat is to be added once the weather improves (clutching at straws here) to give a final finish. The architects sketch which I saw for the street had a beige surface, suggesting this is the final intended finish. Strangely though the sketch never showed all the clutter…bike stands, bollards, the cubes, etc.

Back to the Public Realm Strategy….the public consultation period closed for this on Wed and below are a couple of submissions made by Dublin Civic Trust and the Green Party. The Green Party submission has some good ideas and borrows from previous reports of the quality of the city centre including Dublinspirations (2004) by An Taisce and Defining Dublin’s Historic Core (2010) by Dublin Civic Trust. They also used Twitter to engage public ideas – v novel.

DCT submission http://www.dublincivictrust.ie/news-entry.php?title=trust-submission-on-draft-public-realm-strategy&post=1326880527

Green Party submission http://issuu.com/greenpartyireland/docs/dublin_public_realm_strategy__submission

Back to the real public realm….no movement since Nov on the lighting scheme on College Green.

@gunter wrote:

Thanks for the pics, gunter. I had a look at the botch job myself recently.

What a disappointment.

This scheme enforces the carriageway for cars by cluttering either side of the street with unnecessary furniture to keep pedestrians penned in. In fact, the street is now even more cluttered than it was before.

– Cube-shaped parking bollards passed off as seats. Why can’t we have benches and chairs like any normal city?
– Absolutely massive tree containers that enforce the barrier between the footpath and roadway.
– Those repulsive bin standards from DCC.
– Unsightly “no parking” poles along the street. Get rid of them. There has to be a better way of communicating this information.
– Tarmaced footpaths. How hideously cheap, tacky and downright insulting.
– The road surface is exactly that, a road surface. It’s supposed to be attractive to pedestrians first and foremost.

Oh dear. This does not bode well for DCC’s Public Realm Strategy.

I am not at all surprised. I’d be kidding myself if I thought DCC would ever have the required talent or aesthetic to pull this off.

I expect Clarendon Row and William Street will get the same dreadful treatment: Designed primarily for cars with miscellaneous municipal junk between the roadway and narrow footpath, all topped off with the cheapest tarmac available from DCC’s Roads & Traffic Department.

Disheartened yet again,
Morlan

I took an utterly depressing walk this morning from Fairview into the city centre…utterly utterly depressing.

Thank god for that…

These look smart

A lot of the dodgy concrete blocks removed, sleeker bollards but in. Looks better – even if it the usual random choice of street furniture.

Well bollards are my pet hate and this business of choosing random designs at different locations around the city also bugs me. However they seem to be viewed as a requirement on all streets and I am really not sure where that idea comes from.

These bollards at least cause less clutter than the concrete blocks originally installed.

Listened to various speakers talk about reducing street clutter at the Thomas Street Study yesterday and of course now included in new City Development Plan and Public Realm Strategy but it does seem to take a while to filter through the ranks to design teams and installation. Traffic signs here could have been tackled differently.

The whole point of Fade Street was to try out simple and cost effective solutions to public realm improvement.

Vast improvement, Stephen, but pig’s lipstick comes to mind.

It doesn’t change the fact that DCC have designated this street as a main roadway for vehicles. Pedestrians come last as always.

Haven’t they learnt anything from our European neighbours? You can still have a fully pedestrianised street with feithicil access by the use of simple markings.

How simple was that? Remove the daft poles and use one surface for the street. Now we have an attractive pedestrian street that can still be used by cars.

Christ above. It really isn’t that difficult. I dread to think what the eejits in DCC have in store for the rest of the Grafton Street area.

I have found the concrete blocks previously mooted for the street…around the corner on Clarendon Street blocking up a parking bay.

Frank McDonald derides Irish attitudes to public realm works in the Irish Times http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/magazine/2012/0421/1224314944651.html …and longs for France.

And today works begin on Palace Street to create a more appropriate pedestrian entrance to Dublin Castle. The works are due for completion in July. The details are here http://www.dublincity.ie/swiftlg/apas/run/WPHAPPDETAIL.DisplayUrl?theApnID=2598/11&backURL=%3Ca%20href=wphappcriteria.display?paSearchKey=1692346%3ESearch%20Criteria%3C/a%3E%20%3E%20%3Ca%20href=’wphappsearchres.displayResultsURLResultID=2094028%26StartIndex=11%26SortOrder=APNID:asc%26DispResultsAs=WPHAPPSEARCHRES%26BackURL=%3Ca%20href=wphappcriteria.display?paSearchKey=1692346%3ESearch%20Criteria%3C/a%3E’%3ESearch%20Results%3C/a%3E …minus details of the amendments made during the Part VIII process. One of the first elements to fall foul of DCC Roads was the staggered pedestrian crossing over Dame Street. This crossing would have formed part of the pavement differentiation used to denote the course of the River Poddle.

We shall see how the works progress but I am not particularly happy about the design put forward. A simple scheme of cobbles and Wicklow granite with historic standards would have sufficed. This contemporary scheme just adds to the mishmash around the environs of the Castle in my view.

The works were proposed by DCC Heritage Office (not City Architects) and funded by the NTA.