dodger
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dodger
Participantagreed – almost an endless list – cashel though must be the best. kilmacdough in glawey is a special place too.
dodger
ParticipantDoes anybody know the furture of the loop line bridge after the interconnector is finished? I expect they will retain it even though it seems like a glorious opportunity to consign the scar that it is to the bosca bruscar of history!
October 25, 2005 at 5:20 pm in reply to: Easter I916 Commemorative Military Parades to return to Dublin #762708dodger
ParticipantIt seems to me there’s two issues surrounding this. Fistly should we be celebrating 1916 at all and secondly is this the appropriate way to mark it.
On the first question i’m unashamedly in the ‘let’s mark it camp’. In fact its embarrassing how little is done to commemorate those who died in the quest for Irish freedom. As an event it is the single most important thing to happen in ireland since the famine. We all know that it was not universally supported (anything but) and this is part of the monumental significance of the occasion – the change of people’s perceptions and the unstoppable popular demand for independence that resulted. If we value our independence at all (which i and most irish people do) then it is appropriate to commemorate those who acheived it.
The second question is less black and white and i can empathise with those who don’t enjoy military show’s of strength. We should however focus on the fact that the Irish military has had an exemplary record – no invasions, no war-crimes. We should be proud of them.
dodger
Participantexactly, at least when the GAA swapped their crumbling patchwork of a stadium for new shiny plastic seats at a cost of several hundred million they also actually added 20,000 to the capacity.
I’ve said it before – this stadium is so constrained by its location and perceived threats posed by residents to be very unambitious.
Finally when you spend 300- 400 million on a astadium and don’t increase capacity it can only mean one thing – higher ticket prices.
dodger
ParticipantSure our Government is rolling in millions of euro, bout time they wasted some of it on sport as well as unused electronic voting boxes, etc…..
so we’re in agreement then.
dodger
ParticipantIf we can keep to intelligent conversation for a second i can think of 100 better things this country could spend 300 million on than a non needed second stadium in Dublin. Health, Transport, Schools.
Personally i supported Luas, i supported Croke Park, i still defend the spire but i am entitled to the view that the redevelopment of Lansdowne road is a waste of tax payers money – not because it will be a white elephant but because is it not needed and nothing you have said that convinced me in the slightest that it is.
I finally can’t agree that using phrases like ‘taking head out of provincial arses ‘is well said – actually its fairly base.
dodger
Participantif Croker can handle all the games while Lansdowne is being rebuilt then it clearly is deeemd capable of handling all whether or not Lansdowne is rebuilt. Surely this is self evident. The reason we are talking about building a second stadium is not because Croke park can’t host all the games required.
dodger
Participanti’m sure it’ll be used alright – but most of the time its being used Croke park will lie empty. nobody has managed to convince me that this is not a massive waste of taxpayers and sporting organisations money!
I got Scotland’s population wrong – i always thought it was 15 million! Anyway not only do we have Croke Park but also Pairc Ui Coaimhe, Semple Stadium, Thomond, Gaalic stadium etc etc – these are good big grounds too, the match of all but the very best in Scotland. Would there be any point in cardiff building two millennium domes?
dodger
ParticipantThe Croke Park surface can handle the pressure – its been designed for it – the schedule this summer has been particularly punishing and there’s not a mark on the pitch. Going forward the GAA plan to have fewer matches in HQ and more in the provinces (due to lower attendances and not the surface) so its ability to hold more games would improve even further.
With all due respect to Scotland they don’t need all those stadia either, it has a population over 10 times that of Dublin, a soccer league that people actually go and watch and none of the stadia are of the quality of Croke Park or the proposed Lansdowne road (in fact many of them are falling down). Its not a good example and not one i’d follow.
dodger
ParticipantAfter an intial positive reaction to the new proposed stadium i’m having some ‘aftershock’ of disappointment. The design lacks ambition. In order to pacify residents they’ve gone to the other extreme and produced in effect a three sided stadium. The north end will leak atmosphere from the stadium like a sieve. To an extent Croke Park has the same issue but at least there hill16 is of significant heigth and it is a terrace which mitigates against any loss of atmosphere.
There should also be a terrace in lansdowne for the rugby games. Swapping the present North terrace for a mickey mouse northern stand is a mistake.
Its unlikely the GAA will want to use this stadium – why would they pay the FAI/IRFU when they have an ample and superior stadium themselves. A half full croke park is better for the GAA than a full lansdowne they would have to pay for, At the same time the FAI/IRFU will constantly find themselves under pressure from supporters to use Croker for the big games.
Finally i can’t shake the conviction that Dublin doesn’t need two large expensive stadia. I am convinced that time would have been better spent coming to final agreement on the use of Croke Park by all three organisations. Thereby saving the tax payer millions and having increased access to all sports while also generating more revenue for the GAA (all of which is pumped into local communities).
dodger
Participantheard about this on the radio today – sounds like an interesting development.
How they came up with a name so synonomous with disaster though i’ll never know. The Titanic quarter is hardly going to reassure any risk averse investors!
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Participantand a good tourist route too from the park to teh memorial gardens and on to kilmainham.
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ParticipantThere was talk some time ago of a pedestrian bridge from approx the ucd boathouse thereby opening up access from pheonix park. I would be a major proponent of this – and if only the aforementioned boathouse monstrosity could be replaced/moved upriver at the same time.
dodger
Participant@kefu wrote:
We have had eighty years of independence to add to the stock of great buildings in Dublin and haven’t done such a good job.
That may be true but there are also good examples of talented irish architects forced to emigrate as a result of misrule – take James Hoban of Kilkenny – built the Whitehouse and the carolina statehouse. He could have been our Gandon.
dodger
Participant@crestfield wrote:
Don’t forget that Prince Albert is still standing proundly on Leinster Lawn 😀
wouldn’t miss him one bit if somebody was to suggest a trip for him down under. He must be missing his missus. this is a connection with the past that i’d like consigned there – to the past.
dodger
Participanti wouldn’t sugest we destroy everything built during the occupation – far from it – that would mean dismantling everything from Trim castle up. However some things should go and others were correctly removed.
Take the queen victoria statue outside the dail for instance. It would be utterly incongrous and at odds with the exercise of independent government in the houses of the Oireachtais to have let a statue of the figurehead of the country which denied us these rights since 1801 remain there. We gave it to the Australians as a present!
There is a major distinction to be drawn between insignia such as a crown or lion attached to buildings and statues for instance. The latter are clearly erected to memorialise individuals / events and i for one could not countenance the likes of Nelson, Victoria, Gough, William (all gone now) etc (who like it or not took hands in the subjugation of a race) looking down at me from their plinths. The odd crown attachment etc can stay as far as i’m concerned.
One last point while we consider what grand buildings the British gave us. We can have no idea of what would have built by the Irish themselves in their places had we not been colonised and our native industries, trades destroyed. Who is to say we would not have built grander and better. Afterall pre colonisation we were doing alright and had made a contribution to international architecture.
dodger
Participantthis thread seems to be going off on a life of its own.
The fact is that we were a British colony whether we like it or not.
However there is a case for renaming streets etc in certain cases. Afetr all we did so with the train stations – Heuston, Connolly, Mallin, ceannt etc and who would argue with that? Pearse got a street and a station renamed for him. Would we prefer to sit in traffic on Great Brunswick st (as it was known)? In cases where it is fitting to commemorate a great irish man or woman then i would be 100% behind renaming a street whihc bears the trappings of our colonial past. Particularly where the streets bear the names of trueenemies of the Irish people like Camden.
It is perfectly natural for an indepenedent state to remove trappings of a misruled past. In the same way as granite swastikas were destroyed in Warsaw, Amsterdam and Paris
dodger
ParticipantThe Four Courts has a crown/standard or two.
Then there’s the bandstand in Dun laoire (perhaps not a building) which was reinstated for some bizarre and shameful reason.
dodger
Participanthe’s right to some extent –
loop line and liberty hall should go – two horrible structures with nothing going for them in my opinion.
If by toll bridges he’s talking about the eastlink then he’s bang on.
dodger
Participantwas the idea not to ensure that from each tower you could see the next one along the coast so that a fire signal could be sent to Dublin should the French appear anywhere on the irish sea from Wexford up?
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