Dublin Street Lighting

dublin south county council now has a mapped report a fault system for any of south dublins busybodies,

http://connect.southdublin.ie/connect/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=60&Itemid=249
for reporting broken lights etc

This has been a great thread, I hope people are still interested.

Dublin City Council make lofty claims about protection of architectural heritage, when evidently it did not occur to them that street furniture and in particular street lighting are a very important part of that remit. It has been confirmed to me that all of the 1930s lamp posts have been ‘thrown out’.

The Merrion Square installation was done in the 1980s by a lighting technician from the Lighting Department, i.e., someone with zero conservation training, who took a passing interest.

This is why you end up with the 30s lanterns on the 1903 brackets. This is why 30s lamps are removed from the streets because they don’t fit in with someone’s personal idea of ‘history’.

I expect someone who makes decisions about the landscape of a European capital city to be trained in conservation or history.

There is evidently no conservation officer working with the Lighting Division. I will be writing to the Heritage Office of Dublin City Council, advising them of my concern and disdain. Please do so too, if you care that your heritage is going to landfill. If people who care say nothing, the people who don’t care get away with everything.

Please write to them!

Dublin City Council
Heritage Office
Block 3, Floor 3
Civic Offices
Dublin 8

Tel: (01) 222 3824
Fax: (01) 222 2271
Email: heritage@dublincity.ie

Graham – another view of those concrete posts on O’Connell Street – from the new Edwin Smith book

I’ve spotted that one myself Smithfield Resi … how it survived several bouts of road widening is beyond me, perhaps that says more about South Dublin County Council than anything else (the Nangor road was previously the main road from Dublin to Newcastle)…another from 1912 has survived on the median of the Naas road between the Red Cow & Newlands Cross.

From The Antique Pavement by Derry O’Connell 1975

A quick perambulation along a thoroughly blacked-out Westmoreland St last evening revealed only a single functioning Public Light fitting on the East-Side of the street.

This shining beacon is tacked on to the facade of the,now empty,former EBS building.

Of itself it`s a fairly brutal fitting as it certainly sits like a zit on the end of a nose,however it is at least working.

The City Council policy for the remainder of that side appears to revolve around the Westin Hotel being good enough to put some candles in their windows as there are NO other public lighting fixtures in place.

The West-Side fares somewhat better with at least two fittings functional,however their output is diminished considerably by the surrounding dense foilage.

What a thoroughly depressing night-time vista this once rather splendind street now presents as it spurs citizens and visitors onto racing through it,lest they experience a mischief.

All the LAP`s and assorted high-sounding plans programmes and intentions do not count for diddley-squat if the Civic Authority do not possess the simple damn interest to take a walk around their own City now and then….after dark that is 😡

It’s now reached the stage where I’m actively considering petioning Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of our nearest neighbours,to see if She may take the Westmoreland St Blackout case on.

I suspect that Dublin City Council’s Public Lighting Section may be fearful of breaching the blackout regulations and allowing the Street to become a target for Boche Bombers or such fiendish types.

I drop in here on an irregular basis,but I retain the hope that someday I shall be able to post a “First Cuckoo of Spring” message and refer in glowing terms to the City Councils recruitment of a Lamplighter and a supply of rushes which could be placed in some framework,perhaps attached to the Portaloos to allow the peasantry to see where to pee,so to speak.

Westmoreland St,up to last week remains in a sea of deep darkness once the Westin turn off their own lights.
Not only is it a depressing sight,but equally it is a Dangerous one,particularly for pedestrians attempting to cross it`s splendid wide aspect.

Incredibly,there are lamp units (albeit horrible but functional industrial units) affixed to frontages but which have not been functional for years,yes YEARS.

With 2016 rapidly approaching,I’m wondering if the street was better lit a century ago than it is today ?

I listen on a regular basis to impressively titled Public Representatives and the likes telling us all about the Knowledge Based Economy and our incredible potential to be innovative and attract Googles,Facebooks,and EBays to our City……perhaps the last-named one might be a source of cheap, working,light-units which some passing African Missionaries might endevour to connect up for us in our hour/century of need. :crazy:

@Alek Smart wrote:

I listen on a regular basis to impressively titled Public Representatives and the likes telling us all about the Knowledge Based Economy and our incredible potential to be innovative and attract Googles,Facebooks,and EBays to our City……perhaps the last-named one might be a source of cheap, working,light-units which some passing African Missionaries might endevour to connect up for us in our hour/century of need. :crazy:

Exactly, we get caught up with creating the internet capital of Europe here in Dublin but can miss out on the basics. I’d love to have a budget of about a €100 million to go round fixing up the footpaths, sorting out streetlighting, cleaning up facades, repainting road markings and removing unnecessary poles. Simple minor works like this would dramatically improve the urban fabric of Dublin and make it a much more livable and attractive place.

The recession is having a terrible impact on the quality of street lighting and the like here in Dublin. Cheap and garish are the order of the day and Dublin City Council barely lifts a finger to do anything about it.