ctesiphon

Fuckwits.

Blood on your hands, DCC, blood on your hands.

Well something with windows would be a start. 😉

I don’t know that I’d put the canopies in the same bracket as the Why Go Bald sign, but you might be right when you say they could be considered apart from the building, and they are certainly very representative of a particular period of Irish design history (though as a fan of modular origami, I might be a little bit biased in my admiration.) They’d make a kind of sense in Collins Barracks in a way, no? Or maybe in the garden at IMMA. 🙂

Incidentally, I felt the same way when Pelican House was demolished. On the footpath in front of the building stood street lamps of a complementary design (2 or 3 of them?), unlike those on the rest of the street. They disappeared in the redevelopment.

And come to think of it, I still haven’t found out what became of the wall-mounted sculpture from the ground floor of the Riada Building in Dame Street (now Starbucks). But I’m getting off topic…

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Graham-
I can’t believe I missed your post the first time round (festive cheer?:o ), and I haven’t been up that way in a while, but that Dunnes is woeful. Just looking at that picture makes me feel queasy; there’s something very unsettling about it. I should go and see it in the flesh.

It was always the intention to keep the back pitch, Peter (not sure who owns it, Tuborg). The new orientation will be the same as the old. Had they turned it 90 degrees, the capacity could have been higher. Perhaps closer to the 65,000 suggested, or possibly more. But as you say, it probably wasn’t possible on this site (with this orientation), which makes me wonder if it might have been possible at another site…

As it is, it accommodates 35,000 fewer than Croke Park and is 15 metres higher. The explanation I got for this recently? It’s because the site is very tight. Indeed…

One other thing- the Tribune reported today that there might be trouble ahead over the demolition of the West Stand. Apparently Irish Rail hasn’t yet agreed to the required line closures. Did you mean Easter 2007 or Easter 2008, alonso? 😉

I don’t think that’s what alonso was suggesting at all, publicrealm. See his post (#112) above. I understood it more as marking the passing of one of the game’s great characters. Aah the memories, alonso, eh?

jimg-
afaik there was an assessment done by the development team of various other sites, including Ringsend. But I’m always suspicious of these things when they’re undertaken by the proponents of a development. An EIS also has a section on ‘Examination of Alternatives’, but this is more to do with finding the most appropriate use for a given site, to if I remember correctly. And again I suspect that this is often a rubber-stamping exercise for a decision made in advance. If the parameters are set correctly, the result will emerge in your favour.

But it’s an interesting point you raise- that any application should be decided solely on its own merit. And based on the planning context for the area, the decision was probably theright one. FWIW, I’d have preferred to see it in Ringsend or the Docklands, with this site developed for housing &c., but I (grudgingly;) ) accept the decision. I think you’re being a bit harsh on the inspector, though. I can see how such a conclusion could be legitimately reached based on the evidence before him- in essence, if the analysis of alternative sites was part of the submission, then he was entitled to consider it. (I should check the Board’s www for more info, really.)

One other thing that caught my eye was the mention that the Board’s decision was based partly on the inclusion of the redevelopment of the stadium in the NDP. But didn’t the NDP only kick in in January of this year? And the oral hearing was before christmas? I understood that a case had to be determined in the context of the legislation, policy and regulations as they were at the time of its submission. (If I’m wrong, I’d appreciate correction.) And I don’t think it was in the previous NDP. So if you were looking for an indication of the desires of the government, you wouldn’t have to look very far.

It’s not in the same league as that office building on the Dodder bridge in Donnybrook obviously (wasn’t legislation on extending the life of PP written [allegedly?] specifically for that building?), but it certainly gave me pause for thought.

Or have I just been spending too much time on conspiracy theory websites?

@alonso wrote:

Maybe they can still tear down the West Stand over Easter.
…
This arena will drag Irish sport into the 21st century (until 11 clowns get on the grass of course)

11? Is that five forwards and six backs? Oh hang on, you meant the other game…]Jaysus just saw that the Inspector recommended refusal!!! WTF?? What was he thinking? Sometimes i believe that there’s some sort of arrangement between the Inspectors and the Bord, whereby the Inspector knows the decision, especially on high profile politically sensitive developments like this, and then writes what he likes, as some sort of sop to the appelants[/QUOTE]
I’m a believer in the Board, but as time goes on I wonder more whether this isn’t ridiculously naive. I’d like not to think so, but the whole Inspector-Board dichotomy is getting harder to ignore. I should have put a few quid on this outcome. (What say ye on Ikea?:rolleyes: )

PS PVCKing- will Leinster play in Lansdowne? The always entertaining Ryle Nugent refers to Donnybrook as ‘The Home of Leinster Rugby’- will it not always be so? I mean, if this decision has taught us nothing else, it’s that Irish rugby is motivated above all else by sentimental nostalgia.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/

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🙂

@stira wrote:

They should build this regardless of the traffic, or de we want to lose 500 jobs and be forced to go up to Belfast.

If this city gets any more congested, 500 jobs lost will seem like small beer.

The IDA already uses a helicopter to transport potential investors to locations around the country as they are afraid the investors would turn and go home if they spent even 10 minutes on our ‘national ‘road’ ‘network’.

And surely better Belfast than Glasgow?

Graham,

Do you mean to say that the steel girder that ran up the party wall between S&I and the new yoke has been covered over? I passed today but didn’t spot it, though that was probably more to do with the van reversing into my path. I must look again.

@manifesta wrote:

Perhaps you would be so kind, ctesiphon, as to direct the editors of the Irish Times to my influential text, Will Somebody Please Call Christo?: Manifesta’s Compendium of Irish Snarkitecture? It’s chock-a-block with bits of snark and wisdom collected over my career and can be liberally quoted from royalty free. It works especially well embedded in otherwise perfectly reasonable, erudite articles such as Frank McDonald’s essays and/or dissertations in need of that extra je ne sais quoi.

Is that the one illustrated by El_Architino? I’ve only ever heard rumours of its existence- thanks for the confirmation. Ebay here I come!

I’ll put it on the shelf beside A Guide to the Discreet Use of Emoticons by hutton, Ellipsis Mon Amour by Alek Smart and Learning How to Count to 10, which I authored myself. Now all I need is to track down phil’s Internet Acronyms For Today – BTW, ROFL and Beyond and I’ll have the set!

@phil wrote:

Incidently, where are those three statues now? anyone have any ideas?

On sentry duty, guarding the mountain of historic granite paving prior to its reinstatement outside the Olympia.

Good point re the need for more actual criticism too, phil, rather than the too-easy negativity. There are other procedural and policy questions that I’d love to have answers to. Between this nonsense and the JC Decaux fiasco, the City Council’s reputation as guardians of the city for its citizens has taken a bit of a battering.

Anyone have Max Clifford’s number?

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/property/2007/0308/1173121294228.html

Peculiar? Eccentric? why City Hall’s new neighbour is all wrong

The new building in Dame Street beside City Hall may be the most detested addition to Dublin, writes Frank McDonald , Environment Editor

It was to be a landmark building, and it certainly is – but not in the way Dublin City Council might have hoped when the plans were first unveiled in 2001.

It was also to be a public building with a cultural use – a Revenue museum was intended – but instead it’s the city’s most peculiar spec-built office block.

The idea that lay behind it was a good one – to repair some of the damage caused by the roads engineers when they drew a line through an intact ensemble of Georgian buildings on Dame Street and Palace Street, just east of City Hall, with the aim of widening the main carriageway.

This was planned and executed in the 1970s at a time when the grim-reaper engineers regarded much of Dublin’s older fabric as little more than an obstacle to traffic movement.

And their misguided thesis was endorsed by narrow-minded bureaucrats and ignorant councillors, despite heartfelt pleas by conservationists.

Had it not been for the late George Weekes, secretary of the Sick and Indigent Roomkeepers’ Society – the city’s oldest charity – its headquarters on Palace Street would also have been cleared into a skip. But although the building was spared, its party wall was left exposed, complete with blocked-up fireplaces.

After years lying derelict, with buddleia flourishing behind a slatted timber fence painted alternately blue and white, the leftover site was laid out as a “pocket park” in 1988, with fast-growing sycamores to cover up the scar, twin circular podiums of grass and three statues forlornly gathered around a pool and fountain.

Though quite popular in summertime, the “park” always looked like something of a stopgap measure, pending a more definitive response by the city administration. And this finally came in 1999 when city architect Jim Barrett commissioned David Mackay, of Barcelona architects MBM, to design a building for the site.

Mackay (73) was one of the “three wise men” engaged by Barrett to give independent advice on major schemes for the city, the others being Richard MacCormac and John Worthington. Through MBM, he also had a proven track record as a master planner – notably in laying out Barcelona’s Olympic Village and harbour for 1992.

In his prologue for MBM’s latest brochure, critic Deyan Sudjic describes them as “architects of sensitivity and discretion. They are not interested in creating aggressive or spectacular architectural objects, or signature buildings. Yet they make buildings with a distinctive flavour and warmth that clearly demonstrate their roots”. To them, Sudjic writes, architecture is “about making places, about the manipulation of space, about the tactile quality of materials”.

Through five decades of work, MBM had “remained focused on this definition”, retaining and refreshing its creative energy to be “a powerful voice for a dignified vision of architecture and urbanism”.

So how is that vision translated into the new building and public space beside City Hall? Not very well is the answer. Part of the problem is that the building itself seems cropped, to preserve views of the east elevation of City Hall, while the landscaped plaza is so hard that it is likely to set back “hard landscaping” for years.

A 1999 sketch in MBM’s brochure shows that the original plan involved excavating the site to create an exhibition area beneath the plaza with a flush rooflight, billed as a “Window to Bloomsday room”.

In this same drawing, the plaza itself is misnamed “12th of June Square”, though everyone knows Bloomsday is on June 16th.

“This project stems from the idea of turning the space into a real, clearly defined square”, according to the accompanying text.

“It is, then, a building with almost no functional programme; it is purely an urban design resource, architecture to formalise a space that needs to be a worthy representative of the city centre.”

It clearly fails to do this, however. The elongated mosaic-clad half-dome is particularly eccentric; obviously intended to defer to the dome of City Hall, it only succeeds in competing with its august neighbour. The steel gantry extending from the parapet is another gratuitous eccentricity, with no obvious purpose.

The main façade is also jarring. The squat, bunker-like ground floor, with its cut-out entrance, resembles a security installation.

Above it, the outer glazed “skin” sits uneasily in front of an inner leaf of timber and glass; this probably accounts for the use of dayglo green strip lighting to distract passers-by at night.

The building is otherwise clad in polished stone, supposedly to reflect the more ornate fa̤ade of the former Munster and Leinster Bank (now AIB) on the east side of Palace Street. But the stone merely makes it appear more heavy-handed than it would have been if lighter materials Рsuch as glass Рhad been used instead.

The west side of the building is curiously blank, except for a flying staircase (in galvanised steel) that leads down to the plaza from a doorway on the first floor. This is probably a fire escape, since it appears to serve no other purpose; it was originally intended to be a separate entrance to the four office floors.

Archaeological remains, including a defensive ditch of the old city wall, prohibited building the underground museum originally envisaged. A tiny chamber, echoing Micha Ullman’s book-burning monument in Berlin’s Bebelplatz, has a rooflight and a competition is to be held to fill it with something on the Bloomsday theme. Apart from some spindly trees in the background, the plaza has 12 granite-topped seats (with studs to deter skateboarders) that light up at night. However, it is planned that the café under City Hall will spill out onto the plaza, with tables and chairs under white umbrellas, so that should enliven the space during the day.

The Archeire website (archeire.com) is full of criticism. “It’s such a huge disappointment,” says Paul Clerkin, its moderator. “A fabulous site surrounded by some great buildings, it screamed for lightness of touch but instead we have Son of Sam.” Another blogger wrote: “I liked this street much better with only one Sick and Indigent house on it”.

Dublin City Council deserves credit for having the guts to go ahead with other speculative office blocks, such as architect Shay Cleary’s building beside the Mansion House or Donnelly Turpin’s office in Tara Street, now occupied by The Irish Times. But everyone is capable of making a wrong call, and the new Dame Street building is just that.

It may even be the most detested new addition to the city – and the fact that it stands on the main civic processional route between Christ Church and Parnell Square makes it almost unforgivable.

© 2007 The Irish Times

And manifesta gets quoted again! 🙂 Ever thought about writing headlines for the Irish Times? They seem to like your style.