New Point

There’s a huge thread about it here:
https://archiseek.com/content/showthread.php?t=5951

@igy wrote:

There’s a huge thread about it here:
https://archiseek.com/content/showthread.php?t=5951

That thread is about the tower. Gez is looking for info about the Depot.

There was an animation by a UK company showing the new layout of the Depot but I can’t for the life of me find it. I thought it was on YouTube.. Can anyone recall?

still looking for info on the this project-anyone got any ideas?

from http://www.livenation.ie/

The Point is presently undergoing a complete transformation. The €80m scheme will feature expanded and improved facilities which will enhance the overall customer experience. The heritage and character of the old Point will be preserved and in some areas we will be highlighting the original design of this historic building along with a mix of the new. The new Point is due to re-open again in late 2008 with a much increased capacity in the style of a custom designed music amphitheatre with excellent auditorium acoustics and sightlines.

The artistes that play The Point say time after time that the Irish audience is the best in the world and therefore we at The Point are creating a venue that will be internationally lauded by both audiences and performers alike.

Updated details of the progress of the building scheme will appear regularly on this website.

NEW POINT CONTACT TELEPHONE NUMBERS: 01 6766144, 01 6766154, 016766170

Looked at HOK and Buro Happold sites – no info there at all. Must be a bog bloody secret or somethin

I remember seeing a presentation of the plans a few years ago. The main idea was that it would be enlarged by demolishing one wall – the west wall – of the train shed and turning the venue through 90 degrees so that the audience would face west instead of south. This would allow the capacity to be doubled from about 7,500 to about 15,000; this was needed in order to attract the bigger international acts.

i work with one of the companies involved and just had a look through some of the images on our internal folders and am not to sure i am a fan of the design.
from what i can make out the main enterance facade is staying but the enterance is being relocated to the quayside.
the building itself is constructed of new and existing stonework and there is a glass box sitting on top of it. although during the day it (glass box) will look strange it appears to light up pretty well.

because i am not working on the job i have no idea of the secrecy behind it and so i wont be posting any pictures..

Its due to reopen in november this year !!??

Thanks Overworked; that’s the first time I have seen that.

You can dispense with that olde worlde The Point name now and demand the taxi driver makes haste to The O2 ! Heritage me arse

RTE have a nice mock up of the U2 tower in there too :rolleyes:

http://www.rte.ie/arts/2008/0702/pointtheatre.html

http://www.theo2.ie/

well that’s just shocking news. Who sold the naming rights anyway? who’s were they to sell?

Is it me or does that interior shot on the O2 link still look like a shed? If they still don’t get the acoustics right – a shed is a shed (shed….shed………shed…………shed) [if you catch my meaning]

Who’s going to call it “The O2”. It doesn’t exactly run off the tongue, does it.

I wonder how much that set them back.

A recent snap (Monday) of the Point, sorry O2, for anyone who’s interested. Can’t say it offends the way I thought it might, but it doesn’t exactly raise the pulse either. The blue air-conditioning unit looks like a bit of an oversight!

jesus…hope its better on the inside than the outside.. thats fugly.
Hopefully they sort out the dismal sound in there too.

@Rusty Cogs wrote:

RTE have a nice mock up of the U2 tower in there too :rolleyes:

http://www.rte.ie/arts/2008/0702/pointtheatre.html

Your comment got lost in the ether! Great to see RTE with an up to date picture gallery

I can’t believe they’ve renamed it the O2.
Firstly, that’s already been used as the new name of the Millenium Dome.

Secondly, it’s a rubbish name.

And thirdly, The Point’s a part of Dublin History. Imagine them renaming Croke Park, Heineken Park.

Exatly it is a part of Dublin’s history. I for one will never call it anything other than The Point

Opal Fruits

Kingstown.

Marathon

Dingle

The Corpo

46a

The EEC
Datsun
The Royal Zoological Gardens
Corporation St.

Archeire

Prince 🙂

In keeping with the original and latter theme

The Hype

ct 46A?

Esat Digifone
Eircell

Telecom Eireann indeed

The English First Division

Linesman

High Rise element (now it’s “landmark” or “signature” or a “gateway”)

Recession (adjustment)

@alonso wrote:

ct 46A?

The Stillorgan Flyer, of course. Do keep up, alonso.

@alonso wrote:

Telecom Eireann

You mean The P and T?

:p

ah yeh P and T. As for the Stillorgan Flyer I think I saw an ad for that on Network 2 and heard one on Rock 104. Great days. Great days indeed

I was down there today, and I think its safe to say that the new auditorium is going to blow your socks off !!!
Roll on Coldplay in December:D:D:D

@Overworked wrote:

Roll on Coldplay in December:D:D:D

Only if you supply me with a steamroller 😉

Please see pic from Point Village thread…..

This is gonna be a great venue, kinda terrible looking exterior however. But the whole scheme must be welcomed, especially as it is near completion too, and it was built so quickly. Another great addition for the city!

Thats a lot of seating….

Hate seating at gigs.

yeh no standing at all by the looks of things… pants to that!

Looks like there’s a small bit, smaller than there was in ther old point.

Who’s the genius who came up with that idea? Sitting at concerts is what people do when they can’t get a Standing ticket.

No, I heard Crosbie himself on the radio say that the teirs can be completely pulled back or removed, the whole thing is modular … i presume the higher tier would always remain though.

Capacity something like 9k seated up to a max of 14k under a seating / standing arrangement … hate sitting at gigs myself.

Standing:
http://www.ticketmaster.ie/seatingchart/197033/12163

Seating:
http://www.ticketmaster.ie/seatingchart/197033/12160

Easy enough to make sense of it.

Ok, I take it back, there’s a decent amount of standing there.
I quite like the look of the layout. Even people far at the back, will have a good view.

front row of seats are retractable, as you can see in the pic. Upper levels permanent.:D

Mods : please close this thread until I wrangle an AC/DC ticket from somewhere. I’m crestfallen((((((

And so the O2 (aka the Point) has opened….to the fanfare of U2 warbling a Bob Dylan song on the news, as they did all them years ago when the Point first opened as a music venue.

The Childline concert packed out the place on it’s opening night, last night. It looked jammers on the news.

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/music/o2-rocks–to-sound-of-music-1577499.html

Another great addition to the city (even if the outside of it looks kinda like a non event)

however the interior looked impressive on the news!

Pity that it looks like a Pharmaceutical Plant from the outside though.

Hope its a success.

where do we park?

I shall give a firsthand report on the venue after Kings of Leon on friday night

@henno wrote:

where do we park?

In any one of the 3 car parks within a ten minute walk, Connolly, Commons Street or NCIRL.

@henno wrote:

where do we park?

Surely, as is fully explained in the Bonfire of the Vanities, one arrives and leaves in a limousine to this sort of venue. 😡

Indeed the public access aspect of this venue has been, and will be, a problem for ever more. One night a taxi from the airport made the error of opting for the East Link as the Point was, unknown to me and the driver, active. Boy was I screwed and trapped in a roadway of no return.

Indeed, I dread the thought of combined events at the yet to open Conference Centre and the Point on traffic flows in this area. A ten minute walk to Connolly from the Point for parking or other purposes, – sounds very optimistic to me.

there will be a Luas on the doorsteps of both venues which will take peopl from O C St. Also i heard something about shuttle buses

It’s probably more like a 15-20 minute walk to the Point from Connolly.
What I’m wondering is when did we reach the point where that length of a walk was completely unacceptable. Surely, when attending major sporting/music events, that type of thing is pretty much the norm.

High heels? Winter? Rain?

Why would any able bodied person even think of driving to such a large venue, sure while we’re at it why not construct 80000 spaces for croke park and we can all drive to the door or better still, drive in stadia! now there’s an idea :rolleyes:

Regardles of the size of car park that goes in, accessing it will be mayhem, think i’ll walk.

Wear flat shoes … it’s cold, so what, we’re not in california …. carry an umbrella

Here is a video from the childline concert, where we get to see just how big the O2 is…

how small you mean

LE it fits 14,000 people – exactly the size of purpose built arena we have been crying out for in this country. what little of that video i could stand doesn’t do it justice.

Last night the full floor was standing and the scale of the upper seated tier was incredible. The venue is vast, the ceiling is a mile high, the PA system is lunatic in size, the lights and overall set up for a rock gig is second to none in this country, the view from all plcaes is perfect – no more poles in the way etc. The Point, in my opinion, has gone from Dublin’s worst music venue to possibly the best – you can even have your pint in the main hall which is a very very welcome change (at least until said pint gets moshed into your face but that;s a whole other matter)

Onto the gripes – queuing! The line for the bars in between bands was horrendous and we had to queue to get our tickets scanned in order to have a feckin smoke, which seemed nonsense. Orientation isn’t great, signing is quite poor and there’s a weird one way systems around the toilets which seemed to have been abandoned by the end of the show – but once you’ve been once i guess that no longer presents a problem

Overall though, despite all the reservations on the design, this is now a fantastic music venue and now finally performs its primary function to the desired standard…

Was at Snow Patrol last night and once again the venue was perfect and they seemed to have abandoned the silly scanning tickets for a smoke practice and any attempts at a one-way system. Plus there were sh4g all queues for the bar. Sounded incredible. Looked amazing. Brilliant gig overall.