New street and redevelopment for Dublin ?

Current state of play on the adhesive backed school of symmetry. Excuse the dodgy camera phone quality.

I think somebody mentioned that this looked like some UK post war new town. I lived in Coventry for a while and had a love hate relationship with its once groundbreaking precinct. By 1998 The precinct was a sad example of faded crumbling modernism.

http://www.historiccoventry.co.uk/nowandthen/precinct-west.php

Won’t somebody ever realize that modern style geometric buildings have a shelf life of about 30 years? It’s never a good idea to put experimental designs in a city centre. Years from now, people will wonder what in the world were the architects thinking as over time these fads change and taste differs. What will happen is they will replace a 1960’s building (remind you that at the time they thought these buildings were great) with another ugly monster that our kids will be anxious to see torn down. It would be amazing to see the entire development done in a classical style. Why do architects shy from this?

So it appears that this has been granted by DCC. I haven’t yet seen the details. What are the chaces they amended that stupid ramp off O’Connell Street?

(5170/06 if you’re searching the DCC website.)

Not so fast alonso. That Condition concerns site access during construction – not the final access arrangements for the carpark. See Directive 1 for that:

(1.0) Transport and Traffic: (1.1) Notwithstanding the submitted Mobility Management Plan the applicant is requested to submit further justification for the location of the proposed underground car parking access arrangements on O’Connell Street. In this regard the applicant is requested to itemise all those reasonable alternative design solutions that were considered. These should be clearly set out in a detailed matrix, and assessed accordingly having regard to the following (amongst others) criteria – Traffic implications for O’Connell Street – Traffic implications for extended local road network – Impact on LUAS operations – Possible impact on Metro operations – Visual impact on O’Connell Street – Impact on Dublin Bus operations – Impact on pedestrian flows immediate at Easons (directly opposite access dip) – Impact on wider pedestrian movement (including intersection Princess Street/O’Connell Street) – Impact on those with disability and impaired mobility. – Impact on sustainability of proposed retail development itself. (1.2) Having regard to the above, the applicant is requested to submit further information with regard to the detailing of any proposed vehicular access onto O’Connell Street. This should include extensive examples of imagery and drawings (including detailed materials of thereof) of similar such successful underground car parking arrangements elsewhere. The submission should also include a comparative analysis as to the rationale of the preferred design solution having regard to alternative access arrangements considered, for example access off Abbey Street or via Liffey Street. This should also include an analysis of differing depths of gradient etc, and innovative and alternative architectural solutions that would add rather than substantially detract from the public domain. The analysis shall also show how the proposed car park access will affect the level of service for pedestrians along O’Connell Street. This should be accompanied with a safety audit based on peak pedestrian congestion levels.

mea culpa alonso, misread it – the ramp is dead.

So Arnotts is literally to turn a corner ?
My enthusiasm for this project waned when I saw the proposal for Arnotts original facade – I understand its little more than that, a facade, but its stature provides Henry Street with some of the consistency i think it needs amidst so many one offs.

There is no reason, other than squeezing the maximum out of the site, that the street could not have punched through the 60’s block instead, half of which is all that would have been required.

The proposed reconfiguration has some merit, but its impact is lost facing on to such a narrow street together with the massing & bulk of its proposed opposite number, which will dominate, where once Arnotts did.

You’d literally have to plant yourself half way in to Roches to take in its reconfigured facade in one eye shot, or one camera shot for that matter !

There are many good points to this project, particularly giving Princes Street a purpose, but I’ll be sad to see half of the fine Arnotts facade turn on to what will be a very narrow side street.

Arnotts buys two Abbey Street pubs
29 July 2007 By Neil Callanan and Michelle Devane
Arnotts, the Dublin department store, has bought Kielys bar on Abbey Street and the adjoining K3 pub.

The retailer is believed to have paid as much as €10 million for the pub, which closed two weeks ago. The property is likely to be redeveloped.

The Kielys group will continue to own its pubs in Donnybrook and Mount Merrion. It opened the two bars on Abbey Street in 2000 after it acquired the former Coopers pub in 1999 and redeveloped it.

Arnotts has spent more than €100 million in recent years on buying up properties in the Abbey Street area, ahead of the redevelopment of the department store and adjoining properties.

Planning permission was recently granted for the €700million redevelopment, dubbed the Northern Quarter, which will create large shops to cater for the retailer’s expansion plans as well as leisure facilities, offices and apartments.

Arnotts is also planning to appoint a partner for the project in the coming months.

In order to continue trading during the redevelopment, the retailer bought the lease to the Debenhams outlet in the Jervis Street shopping centre. To help fund the expansion, it is selling two sites on Dominick Street, each of which has a guide price of more than €4 million.

Nobody was available at either Arnotts or Kielys for comment about last week’s deal.

From the Independent..

Arnotts in €1bn move to allow for urban revamp
Plans include a four-star hotel, 175 apartments and 47 shops

Arnotts and its development partner British urban regeneration specialist Crentros Miller will break ground at the €1bn, eight-acre Northern Quarter development in Dublin’s north inner city in September.

The project, due for completion in 2011, is currently before An Bord Pleanala, the planning appeals board, with a go-ahead expected to be given shortly.

Yesterday informed sources said that Arnotts, which is 45pc-owned by Niall McFadden’s Boundary Capital and Anglo Irish Bank, is confident about the future of the development against the backdrop of fears of a recession in the US spreading across the Atlantic.

The source said that Dublin’s Henry Street has the highest footfall rates in Europe and that the Northern Quarter development is a long term project.

Arnotts is already talking to a number of household names like Abercrombie & Fitch and Armani as anchor tenants.

The development will include 47 shops, 14 cafes, restaurants and bars, 175 apartments and an 149-bed four-star hotel.

The Northern Quarter also features mixed-use urban development, with an integration of retail, residential, leisure and hotel/spa facilities.

The main feature of the development is to recreate Prince’s Street as an urban street and pedestrian thoroughfare connecting the centre of O’Connell Street, through to Henry Street with a new public square at its centre.

It is expected that the development could act as a catalyst for further development in the Lotts Street area which is adjacent to the River Liffey.

According to the most recently filed accounts for Arnotts, the company boosted its balance sheet by almost €150m in 2006/2007 period on foot of a January revaluation of its property portfolio.

Additions

The retailer engaged estate agents CB Richard Ellis Gunne to revalue its assets in January of 2007 resulting in the uplift.

As a result of that revaluation, and a handful of additions, Arnotts’ fixed assets came in at €535.5m for the year ended 28 January 2007, up from €328.5m the previous year.

The 2006/7 financial year marks Arnotts’ third full-year results since the company returned to the realm of private business in 2003.

The accounts also showed a slight lift in net sales to €145m while operating profit slumped by €7.3m to €861,000 as administration and other expenses soared prompting annual losses to double to €5.1m.

They also took a €500,000 hit for the elimination of “non-profitable business”, and investing a lot in modernising IT systems.

– Ailish O’Hora Business News Editor

I think this is a very promising development especially for liffey and abbey street.liffey street really has some horrible stores on it from the 2 euro place to all them small stores selling the type of clothes you’d see at a teenage disco with loud music blaring out on the street.plus abbey street, for such a central street is a bit dead at times.all ive ever done is pass through the street and nothing else.hopefully they do get some high quality retailers and not the usual UK multiple.