shanekeane
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@Fairy wrote:
I wrote some time ago that the proposed Opera Centre would not start for at least another two years, if ever!. The Limerick Post ‘front page’ clarifys this, see views from Tony Connolly, Patrick Street, business man and the confirmation he received from City Hall. This is a continuing disgrace. What is going on? I call on on business persons in the detailed region to bin their demands for rates that may be due, and demand City Council knock the lot as Mr Connolly suggested . Yes open the area as a car park, or just board the lot up.. He is correct in saying the buildings are dangerous. So few of us ‘LOOK UP’, I suggest no-one should walk under No.5 Ellen St, as a serious gale/wind will bring down a beam that is at the moment. being supported by nothing other than a sticking plaster. It will mark my words, surly cause serious injury. In the last months the Fire Brigade have blocked the Street twice, (Ellen St,) four in all, with hatchets trying to gain entry to the boarded up premises (all in the early hours of the morning) this was all due to reported suspected fires being started in the buildings.by ??? who were burning mounds of paper in the buildings. I looked for media info on this, but there was none! How can the developers/Council get away with such apathy? IT IS a continuing disgrace, but then again, there is after all only a handful of us that give a damm about the affect this disgrace is affecting this lovly city. I believe if one had to walk through the old Town Hall one would not believe the distruction caused by Vandals. Mr Connolly thank you for your highlighting your genuine concerns.
What exactly do you want to knock down? All the Georgian buildings on Patrick Street, Rutland Street, and Ellen Street? And are you suggesting that a car park would not be an eyesore?
@Dreamstate wrote:
I am so so upset by all this! Just a week ago 5-6 councillors were openly against the ( Boat Club ) scheme ….why the sudden change of mind??? Ladies and Gentlemen , This city is in big trouble and by electing these apes we are all responsible 🙁
I hear that in tribute to this momentous decision, they’re going to put a small sculpture of a brown manila envelope in front of the entrance.
Finally. It completes the block facing onto O’Connell Street in an elegant way, making it one of the most magnificent and architecturally significant blocks of its kind in Ireland.
@spoil_sport wrote:
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, “interesting” does not make good, and yes, to suggest that something meerly “interesting” is good enough, is infact beneath the dignity of Dublin. I am not defending the shit in the docklands, but if you take a 6/7 standard issue, lowest common denominator, docklands style facade and extrude it another 20 stories, it will not really improve matters, the Docklands is not shit simply because it is not highrise, there are far more core and qualitive reasons. There is nothing wrong with highrise, with towers, Dublin has a tradition of towers and landmarks, church spires and domes closing vistas, the chimneys of Guinness, Liberty Hall, etc, I would welcome the U2 tower, albeit without the “U2” and perhaps not a Foster (although, there is strangley a nice balance that Dublin’s most important buildings of the 18C, Customs House, Four Courts, were also designed by a Brit)
I disagree. In a city as architecturally boring as Dublin, interesting is good. Even if it does nothing else, at least some interesting architecture might shake things up a bit. If, instead of what was built there, the docklands took a risk on interesting and possibly bad, then I think it might be a lot better than dull and mediocre. And in a ridiculously conservative and increasingly drab city like Dublin, high rise is interesting.
A big problem is that Dubliners think that Dublin belongs to them. They don’t want high rise in what a lot of small-minded locals think is still the little backwater that Dublin used to be. It doesn’t belong to them. It belongs to the people of Ireland, just like Washington DC belongs to the people of America. And it has a responsibility to create a city which represents the ambition and imagination of Irish people as a whole. It has a responsibility to be a metropolis full of interest and culture of which we can all be proud. And that’s why every little nimby who complains about high rise in Dublin should be ignored. Because it’s not just about the high rise, it’s about the attitude in general. They need to be SHUT UP, with an iron fist if necessary.
@Highrise wrote:
I am not referring to the quality of the architecture in Canary Wharf, I am simply using this as an illustration to show how what can be done in a 10 year period, I could have used Dubai etc
Don’t waste your breath. There’s a lot of people on this site who seem to think that the big, fat, landfill which is the docklands of Dublin is some sort of UNESCO conservation area and who think that building anything more interesting than glass sheds in a CAPITAL CITY is somehow beneath the dignity of Dublin. They will pontificate at wearying length about the architectural shortcomings of highrise buildings in a way that they never would about the square miles of five storey rubbish which have blighted Dublin in the last twenty years, and without recognizing that, given what’s there at the moment, the interest supplied by a cluster of skyscrapers would introduce some much needed dynamism to a dead tract of land, regardless of whether or not the architecture is per se significantly better than the current stock of buildings.
I had a dream last night. What this site requires is a large, slim conical building with a spherical observation deck and restaurant affixed to the top.
@vkid wrote:
Not my intention but i do think some level of compromise is needed and if any are to go(which in this country seems inevitable), then the buildings on Ellen Street would be my choice (Quinns/Vintage Club not included as already stated).
I just hate that street, georgian stock or not its horrible, and retaining those buildings is not going to make it any better imo. Even in the best Limerick Summer 😀 it is dark and grim and i really believe it is the width of the street that makes it so.
Again my opinion and sure we’re all entitled to that..even if we have no real influence on the outcome.
Go to Temple Bar in Dublin and see numerous pokey little lanes which are absolutely charming and full of Georgian buildings. The only reason Ellen Street looks dingy is that it’s got a tiny footpath, there are no standards for shopfronts, and it’s got trees growing out of its buildings. Clean it up a bit and widen the footpaths (or pedestrianize it) and it’ll look great.
I’m sorry to break this to you, but the old Denmark street is already gone. There are about five georgian buildings on it, as the rest had to be removed for the infinitely more aesthetically pleasing car parks etc.
As I understand it, the modified plan for the Opera Centre will involve destroying one entire side of the street and replacing it, presumably, with department store windows. This will ruin the street’s portential, as it will have nothing but a wall running up one entire side, instead of the various individual shops that are there. Just as Arthur’s Quay deadened half of Patrick Street, the Opera Centre will deaden the other half, and now it will deaden Ellen Street too. It’s just a completely atrocious plan.
Well I definitely agree that the 21st century architecture is undistinguished, not least the stumpy high rise buildings. The whole riverside is, in fact, an abject failure. But personally I feel that everything that went on in the city centre in the 20th century made a beautiful city ugly: Arthur’s Quay, Penneys, Roches, Liddy Street, Dunnes Stores, AIB bank, Bank of Ireland, Brown Thomas, the lower end of William Street, Cruises Street. Each and every one of these was a disaster. And, for me, Arthur’s Quay was the worst. Now, all that remains of the warren of the narrow medieval pattern georgian streets around Denmark Street and Ellen Street is a portion of the original Ellen Street which still contains antique shops and the like. And they are now suggesting that it is necessary to pull down this charming street in order to build another Arthur’s Quay? Will they ever learn? Why are the city council, ignorant moronic bumpkins all of them, allowed to make decisions on things like this? They have proven themselves incapable of it in the past. I would suggest that there would not be a flight from the city centre to suburban shopping centres if we had a beautiful historic core which is a pleasure to stroll around, instead of a dirty, intimidating 20th century wasteland. So I don’t think the county council are entirely to blame for the city’s problems.
I don’t deny that other buildings in Limerick are completely ugly too, but Arthur’s Quay is the worst because of its central position which, in my view, completely cheapened the feel of the whole city centre. If we’re talking about the aesthetic qualities of buildings without reference to their context, then everything built in the 20th in the city centre is so awful, that it seems like a waste of time comparing their awfulness. In any case, since my original point was about the mismanagement by the city council, I think the wealth of examples merely supports that point.
I’m going to make a bold but entirely serious statement: Arthur’s Quay shopping centre is the worst city centre building in Europe. Considering that its construction involved the destruction of numerous Georgian buildings, the murdering of several city streets, and the cheapening of the city centre in general, you would have imagined that it would be architecturally worth it. But it’s so nasty and cheap and plasticky and revolting, so gobsmackingly sickening in its aesthetic illiteracy, and so completely mediocre in its scale and ambition, that I honestly can’t think of a single building I’ve ever seen in Europe, not in Glasgow or Romania or anywhere else, that is so objectionable. Most of the twentieth century blight you see in Europe as least has some sort of ambition to it. I was in Hunedoara in Romania, a textbook case of Communist ugliness, and I was less depressed by it than by that shopping centre. Who greenlighted this? Who greenlighted Cruises Street? Those two projects alone did more than anything else to annihilate the Georgian character of Limerick city centre. I call that mismanagement. Now when you combine the breathtaking uglification of Limerick with the gradual decline in society due to badly executed housing projects, I couldn’t imagine a more complete mismanagement of a city. Think about this: in a parallel universe, Limerick city could be a perfectly preserved Georgian city, with an extensive medieval quarter, which is safe to stroll around at night.
@dave123 wrote:
Where is your source?!
I believe that the question you mean to ask is: “What is your source?”
@Fairy wrote:
Read this week, The Opera Centre will NOT commence until 2011 – 3 more years of waiting and having to look at the boarded up buildings on Patrick St, Ruthland St. What a total shambles.
It’s really not that surprising, is it? For 50 years, Limerick has been one of the most mismanaged cities in Western Europe, its innate potential constantly stifled by corruption, stupidity, and laziness. And nothing will happen about it until people start lynching city councillors.
I don’t deny that it has some nice parts too, but the problem is consistency and attention to detail. Too often in Ireland we have pretty or even beautiful buildings undermined by their proximity to rubbish.
@Saucy Jack wrote:
Cork has a fantastic island core with great narrow streets and lanes,river frontage,bridges and above all else excellent topography.
The City has some unique architectural character that Dublin can only dream of.
Loook at Prague,Budapest & Paris – outside their cores are plenty of grey housing and high rise.
You’re like one of those men who become obsessed by an ugly woman and nobody else can understand what they see in her. To compare Cork to Prague, Budapest and Paris is more than slightly ridiculous. My point is not that there isn’t a small amount of character, but that it’s all very badly kept. And the quays in Cork are completely ugly for most of their length.
