Mr MacCabe and his flowerbeds

Merrion Square park criticised as ‘football ground’

Merrion Square park is a “mess” that has become “an incoherent repository for fatuous, opportunistic, politically correct kitsch”, according to a leading town planner. Mr Fergal MacCabe, a past president of the Irish Planning Institute, claims Dublin City Council has “destroyed” the original character and design of the park. Paul Cullen reports.

As a result, he says, the square has turned into “a repository for myriad pieces of second-rate sculpture and semi-tombstones commemorating tree-plantings by minor dignitaries”.

Officially named Archbishop Ryan Park, the 11-acre terrain in the heart of Georgian Dublin is owned by the Catholic Church but leased to the city. Aside from its flowerbeds and tree-lined walks, it is dotted with numerous statues, the best known being that of Oscar Wilde.

Mr MacCabe is opposed to plans to allow public access to the park in nearby Fitzwilliam Square, on which his offices are located. At present, only local residents and offices have keys to this park and its tennis courts.

The Fitzwilliam Square park, he says, is an attractive, recreational space maintained to the highest standards by local people. “It harmonises with the architecture of Fitzwilliam Square and is a premier tourist destination.”

In contrast, Merrion Square had become a “football ground” since it was opened to the public and then filled with “fussy municipal flowerbeds”.

Mr MacCabe claims this is “clear testimony to the inability of the city council’s parks department to design and manage a significant, historic urban park of this kind”.

Mountjoy Square, whose park is also managed by the council, was “just as bad”, he said. “In fact, I cannot think of any new garden or park designed by the parks section of Dublin City Council which displays a competent, let alone sophisticated, design approach or which has any aesthetic merit.”

Mr MacCabe has “strenuously objected” to the proposed inclusion in the next draft development plan for Dublin of an objective “to seek to provide fully public access to and the management of Fitzwilliam Square Park”.

Fitzwilliam Square was likely to be “vandalised” if the council “gets their hands” on the park. The result would be “a deterioration in the character and quality of the last intact Georgian square in the city”.

A council spokesman said it was unable to comment until the development plan was finalised next year.

Well, McCabe does have a point.

Merrion Square has become a statuary dumping ground and in fairness the flowerbeds are always pretty twee.

Not too sure there is much football played though.

@chewy wrote:

but what does he want as an alternative?

fitxwilliam park was closed to the public because peasents couldn’t be trusted to use the park properly does macabe still hold that view ?

young local residents just hope over the fence when they want to use the place, why pay a fee for a key?

Because it would be the best spot in Dublin to put out a deck chair and have a few cans if you lived there,

How much is a key anyway? I thought they went with the houses.

Interesting to see Phoenix Park being mentioned again. Despite the value of wild, barren stretch of land in our ever increasing urban landscape, a planned re-appraisal is definitely required.

Personally I’d love to see the area close to the Zoo being developed as a recreation area. Anyone been to Budapest and visited Margaret’s Island and seen the use of Public Space there ( Water Parks, Bars, Restaurants ) or the park behind Heroes Square ( Zoo, Funfair, Baths ( Indoor and Out ) , Bars etc )?? As is the Park is only accessible to Joggers, those with Cars or to Deer..People don’t go there for any real purpose other than to get out of the house..!!

Isn’t there some Historical laws surrounding development in the Park?

( On another note , getting very annoyed with the City Councils persistence in hanging Christmas lights in those nasty straight lines.. Where’s the love ?? )

It’s exactly Mr MacCabe’s superior attitude, which should convince Dublin City Council of how right it would be to open up Fitzwilliam Square.

I must admit that I like the closed squares – I’ve always fancied a house on Fitzwilliam Square for that reason…

I agree – there’s something of the forbidden fruit about Fitzwilliam Park. It’s the mystery shrouding it that makes it desirable – trying to get a peek through the railings at the outrageous antics of the upper classes 😀

You almost expect there to be a mini-Georgian world in there – there may be Mercs all around, but inside it’s still 1810 🙂

@chewy wrote:

but what does he want as an alternative?

fitzwilliam park was closed to the public because peasents couldn’t be trusted to use the park properly

It was never open to the general public, keyholders are those who own residences on the square (its their front gardens). I think it should be kept private to be honest with you purely on the basis that it would lose its mistique if opened up (and I wouldn’t want my front garden taken over either)

That bloke had a point about Merrion Square – or Dr Dermot Ryan park to give its proper title (caught me out in a pub quiz one time, that one….) it’s a bit of a junkyard and repository for all sorts of garbage. That Oscar Wilde sculpture is rubbish for starters, and what’s Michael Collins’s bust doing sticking its Blueshirt head up in the middle of nowhere, no context, no explanation, just dumped there.

The Oscar Wilde sculpture is splendid, the only problem with it is that the plinths of the two bronze nudes are crappy, but the statue itself is so much fun.

Mr McCabe has a very persuasive letter in todays Irish Times. He points out that he is not against public access to the Square but rather is concerned at what DCC will do with it when they take control. He points our that the three other Squares are less than satisfactory, although I am not sure DCC are to blame for Parnell Sq which has always developed differently from the others (Rotunda, Gate etc). Mountjoys deterioration and less than satisfactory revival can definetly be laid at the poor planning practices of the Corpo in the 50s to 80s. Merrion Sq on the face of it is a nice colourful haven in the city and I am not sure that flower beds and sculpture are completly amiss here. However, a review of some of the elements in the park would be welcome. Maybe creating a feature of historic lamps elsewhere in the city and removing some of the sculpture to more suitable and relevent places.

Ultimately though I favour opening Fitzwilliam to the public. Less of an elistist ‘residents only’ approach to public spaces please.

I think he realised how condescending his original submission to Dublin City Council was. And he was trying to rectify the damage and not appear like the complete snob he is.
He was at particular pains to distinguish between the work of Office of Public Works and DCC. I think his point about Mountjoy Sq being compromised by buildings is a joke. Would he prefer the junkie haven that existed twenty years ago to the one we have now with playgrounds and community facilites.
Turning a blind eye to the very real social issues that pervade in that part of the city – and suggesting that Mountjoy Square had been “compromised” – is very easy when you live in Sandycove and work on Fitzwilliam Square and probably only venture North of the Liffey to go to the airport.

Here’s the letter:-
Madam, – Paul Cullen, in his report of December 4th, on submissions to the Dublin City Plan, omitted my proposal that Dublin City Council should outline its vision for Fitzwilliam Square to the public before embarking on a policy of acquiring and managing it.
Dublin City once had five major urban gardens. Today St Stephen’s Green is excellently managed by the Office of Public Works which has maintained its 19th century character and permitted only the occasional well designed and well located sculptures. Of the Georgian Squares, Parnell Square is built over. Mountjoy Square is compromised by buildings.
In Merrion Square, it is my view that the very high standards adopted by the City Council to control the character of the Georgian buildings around the Square are not extended to Archbishop Ryan Park which I feel is being eroded by inappropriate works.
As regards Fitzwilliam Square, I have no objection whatsoever to the principle of public access – indeed the OPW have shown the way in their admirable opening up of Iveagh Gardens to the public whilst maintaining and enhancing their original character.
However, I would be concerned if public ownership resulted in a loss of the pristine character of the last remaining Georgian garden in the city. – Yours, etc.,
FERGAL McCABE, SUMMERHILL PARADE, SANDYCOVE, CO DUBLIN

@chewy wrote:

ok, good point

then why has front garden merrion square opened to the public and front garden st stephens green opened how are they different?

Merrion Square was sold to the Archbishop of Dublin – hence the official name of the park Dr Ryan Park when it was donated to the city (They had planned to build a big cathederal here at one stage). St Stephen’s Green isn’t a Georgian Square but its ownership was taken over by Lord Ardilaun (Benjemin Lee Guinness – I think) when the centre of the square became derelict. He then renovated it at his own expense and donated it to the city – hence his statue facing out of the Green down York Street. The fact that Fitzwilliam Square is the only one to retain its original ownership structure is what makes it different.

We’re so lucky that the church abandoned the plan for Merrion Square – an image I saw showed something as foul as Galway cathedral squeezed in there…

and galway cathedral was originally planned for eyre sq.