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I wouldn’t be that worried about the overhead lines, there’s always the Bordeaux approach. They have a system where the tram’s powered by live rails that only go live when the tram’s over them making them perfectly safe.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bprYazLzkeU
They’re a version of the same Alstom trams used in Dublin for Luas.
What I find utterly ridiculous about it is that the only reason this major highway is needed is due to pathetic planning.
If we’d proper planning, the towns it serves wouldn’t have Dublin housing estates added onto the sides of them. It’s utter madness that anyone’s even contemplating commuting as far as Navan or Cavan on a regular basis. Dublin’s not THAT big.
Also it’s very unlike the docklands in Dublin, Cork’s docks are very much part of the city centre where as Dublins have historically been a bit of a ‘no go area’ and will require a lot of work to ultimately connect them to the mainstream of the city centre.
The quays (and the docks are just an extension of those) in Cork are very much part of the city itself.
It’s no where near as ‘risky’ as docklands projects in Dublin (or possibly in Belfast and Limerick).
Cork’s docks also have a very spectacular setting which will be highly desirable. Dublins are a lot more post-industrial and need to overcome a major image/marketing problem before they really take off.
It’s a totally different scenario to the IFSC / Grand Canal dock in many ways, even though some of the elements of the site are similar.
The Cork docks are also reachable from the city centre on foot, completely safely.
Where as Dublin’s docks seem to take you through a dodgy area of town before you emerge into the IFSC or Grand Canal area. It never feels connected to the city, but rather a new development near by.Also, the cork docklands area does not have the history of social problems, deprivation etc that seems to be a major issue around parts of the old docklands in Dublin
I don’t think it’ll be a risky developement, nor do I think there’ll be much difficulty convincing individuals or businesses that it’s a nice location.
It’s very much prime real estate waiting to happen.
As for developers:
The established suburbs in Cork are not really any less risky than the docklands area. The major attraction for the docks would be more scope for development in terms of planning / zoning, cheaper land, tax breaks and as the area develops as a location, it will be easier to market, particularly for commercial / office space.I don’t really understand the ‘my city looks bigger than your city’ stuff that goes on here.
None of Ireland’s city centres are particularly overwhelming. Dublin’s core is essentially a small Georgian city with victorian and edwardian bits added on sorrounded by lots of post 1960s sprawl. As an administrative centre, it has a collection of rather more grandeous buildings than those found elsewhere.
Belfast’s a small, relatively unspectacular victorian industrial city (not saying that’s a bad thing) with lots of urban sprawl.
Cork’s a small slightly more quirky maratime/commerical somewhat georgian city with victiorian institutional, commerical and industrial add-ons and somewhat less urban sprawl.
Limerick, Derry, Galway are extremely small cities with the odd interesting bit of architecture and small scale post 60s sprawl. Their cores are nice, but really not much more extensive than a town.
Anything else is just a big town really.
As for Northern English cities, they’re all rather unspecatcular and small city centrewise too. Many being more highrise than Dublin because there wasn’t a whole lot there to start with, they were largely just industrial centres that were often quite grim. Also, WWII didn’t help much as they lost a lot of buildings to the blitz.
As for Dublin, the Loop Line bridge actually makes the city feel a lot smaller than it is, by isolating the old city centre from the customs house and the whole docklands / IFSC development as well as blocking the view of the harbour and Dublin bay.
It’s really as ugly as one of the ‘green monsters’ in Boston. Shame really it’s not re-routable.
Cork’s Docklands project should be a lot more connected to the City as there isn’t that same “City Centre” vs “Quays” vs “Docks” divide.
The South Mall basically leads straight into the edge of the Docklands. It should have a nice feel when it’s finished!
Even the first parts of the development i.e. new stuff along Lapps Quay is very accessible from the city centre. It doesn’t feel isolated or cut off.Where as in Dublin the IFSC is very cut off, you wouldn’t really feel like wandering down there on foot.
Smithfield is similar too, completely isolated from the city centre unless you jump in a Luas.
There’s also a very odd divide between the Dublin 1 and Dublin 2 shopping districts. i.e. Grafton Street and Henry Street.
O’Connell Street and O’Connell bridge completely sepeate them. It’s very odd, as you’d really expect there to be much more commercial and retail development on O’Connell street linking the two areas. Never quite understood why O’Connell Street hasn’t developed properly. Is it entirely down to heavy traffic ?Anyway – perhaps that’s best left to another thread.
I general though, Cork’s quite a well-integrated pedestrian friendly city by Irish standards and seems to be heading rapdily towards being a very pleasant space to wander around.
Re: the eircom HQ
Is there an eircom switch in one of those basements? If so, it’ll likely stay in eircom hands. Moving those exchanges isn’t an easy task as they are the hub for thousands of individual lines.
I know the main eircom switches in Central Dublin are at Dame Court, Adelaide Road and Crown Alley (in Temple Bar). But, it’s likely they’ve some gear in the HQ building too.
What’s happening long-term with the eircom buildings on Stephen’s Green?
They’re due to move fairly soon.Is it just going to be re-used as is or demolished and turned into something else?
It could be used as a public space of some sort. It’s an interesting building, I don’t however think it has much future as a major transport hub. Perhaps, it might be served by Luas / Metro, but not as anything other than a minor station. The site itself has a lot of potential though.
Seems a shame it was allowed to deteriorate so badly though.
I wonder if it was an early example of poor planning. It seems that the builders of the site might have assumed that there was going to be more substantial growth of the city in that direction. Instead, most of the investment in terms of new housing post 1930s went south of the river and most of the business district also migrated to Dublin 2.
Well, so far CIE/Bus Eireann’s track record on provision of public transport in Cork has been laughably bad.
The main reason that Luas is an outstanding success is CIE don’t run it!This “Bus Tram” (Read: articulated bus) looks like a last ditch effort by ‘the lads’ to keep control of the cushy number they have in Cork.
I think it’s really time for a MAJOR shake-up of the transport system in the city. There’s absolutely no reason why it has been so bad for so long.
At the very least we need “Cork Bus” seperated from Bus Eireann so that it can get some local focus and proper investment.
I think Cork’s docklands are more likely to be contiminated in a similiar way to other docklands e.g Dublin etc. There was never any major use of heavy metals down there.
I’d suspect there could be big issues with hydrocarbons though on the former dunlop site and some of the fuel storage areas and the power station.It was also never (as far as I know) used to dump material.
The major risk area for heavy metal contamination in Cork is the former Irish Steel / Irish Ispat site and possibly the Ship yard at Rushbrook too.
@Daragh wrote:
Holy God, I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again… is the Council capable of doing ANYTHING right? I was never a huge fan of the Spire but I was never against it either. But with all the talk of trees having to be permanently felled, bad design (the seams on the spire are so obvious to the naked eye), broken lights (let’s face it, even when the lights ARE working, the entire lighting scheme is still a joke), and cleaning needing to take place every 18 moths or so, I’m actually in now in favour of having the stupid thing removed.
Out of curiosity, how many trees had to be permanently removed? Will their removal greatly affect the tree scheme on the street?
At least four. Maybe six. Looks bad, and there’s now a tacky phone kiosk horribly exposed in the middle of the gap that’s left. Sorry I’ve no pics, never have the camera with me. Apparently, DCC is to plant more trees elsewhere to compensate but surely that’s just making up the numbers. A gap is a gap.
Also, the spire this morning had an enormous filthy brown streak down one side, including the shiny base section..To be fair, this type of bus service is not a new idea for Cork. Its referred to in the CASP (p40, 44 and 140 and Appendix 1). The general thrust being that, even with the type of densification envisaged in the scheme, Cork was not likely to see the type of population density required to justify LRT. Hence ‘guided bus’ or segregated busways.
But, while painting a bus in luas colours and covering the wheels and calling it a “bus-tram” is plain offensive to the intelligence of the general public, if they can generate a fast, efficient and effective solution to the citys public transport needs, it might be worth pretending that the emporer is wearing clothes, after all. Or a disguised loaf is better than no bread …
I think “semi-successful” is being kind.
It’s got visible joins all the way up. The base is completely different to the rest. The lights aren’t great and the bulbs keep popping. It gets filthy after a couple of years and still looks dirty after a very expensive wash. Now we’re told trees have to be permanently felled to accommodate the biggest crane in the country coming on site on a regular basis to maintain it. I’m a fan of the Spire but to me that says major design flaws.@GregF wrote:
I saw the Spire this morning after the clean up. It glistened in the sun and looked good overall, but on close inspection some staining is still disappointingly visible as well as the joints. Also there is a marked difference in tone between the patterned base of the Spire and the rest. A good going over with Duraglit or Brasso would have brought the sheen of the Spire up better.
I saw that some of the new trees were removed for the positionng of the crane. It said on the news that this cleaning will happen every 18 months, which is good as it ‘ll badly need it but will the trees have to be removed on each occasion?The trees that were moved will not be reinstated as DCC are resigned to calling in the crane every few years for a cleanup. The fact that the footprint of a massive crane now has to be factored into the design of the street is a disgrace and shows again what a lie the “self-cleaning” claim was.
Ritchie was asked about it recently and muttered something about the air quality of Dublin, instead of accepting responsibility for his own design that’s proved to be semi-successful at best…If I was from Cork, I’d say nay very loudly and insist on light rail. There’s no such thing as a Luas-style bus system. It’s like promising an aeroplane-like boat system.
There are a few issues in Ireland:
1) Pavements should need to be opened so often. Services go in in a totally unplanned way with no provision made for access.
2) If a contractor opens a pavement and doesn’t restore it to its original state, he should be sued for damages. It’s a waste of tax payers money. We end up footing the bill for expensive repaiving jobs paying for damage inflicted upon our roads and pavements by profitable telecommunications companies, ESB, Bord Gais etc..
I think he was squeezed out by two factors:
1) Micheal McGrath did stunningly well based on the fact that he’s a TD for Carrigaline (and sorrounds). He took a lot of 1st and 2nd pref. votes that would have relligated votes for Boyle to 3 and 4.
McGrath also took on a lot of Boyles policies, e.g. calling for a Cork Luas.
I think a lot of younger voters in those areas in particular would have been more likely to have given Boyle a preference2) The Fianna Fail & Fine Gael presidential style race ‘Bertie V Enda’. It squeezed the Greens everywhere. Fine Gael and Labour did extremely well in South Central and sadly, it was at the expense of a Green Party seat.
He could have done more constituency work, but I don’t really think he had much of a chance given how things played out.
I’m hoping McGrath lives up to his promises and actually does put pressure on to ensure that Cork’s transport issues are addressed. I think his electorate will hold him accountable as there are a lot of commuters in Carrigaline and south cork generally who will be extremely annouyed if he doesn’t deliver.
If the Greens go into Government, you can be pretty sure that Dan Boyle will be made a Senator, so he’ll still be in the public forum and the political system.
I’d say he could be an excellent and high profile senator.
I noticed someone has ripped up some of the new paving on Carey’s Lane or French Church street (can never remember which one’s which). Seems the paving’s been replaced by red cement!
Can’t the city council go after people for this ? It’s vandalism in my books.
Seems it’s a gas connection into one of the buildings along the street.
Surely red-brick paving isn’t THAT hard to replace!
