If ever you go ...

"Shaming the Custom House" Liberty Hall
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I have taken my title from a verse of Paddy Kavanagh's

If ever you go to Dublin town
In a hundred years or so
Inquire for me in Baggot Street 

And what I was like to know.

That was the title for last year's "One City, One Book" and John Dorman has taken some of the poems in the book and sketched the locations described in them.

His exhibition is currently in Raheny library till the end of the month (April). It is well worth a visit. The sketches incorporate buildings and maps of their environment, a sense of object and of place.

The one above is quite obviously Liberty Hall and the accompanying poem by Austin Clarke (below) only goes a small bit of the way to expressing how I feel about this monument to 1960s' hubris and pretentiousness. Anyway, give it a read yourself and see.

Poem written during the construction of Liberty Hall

Part of the exhibition in Raheny library

You can see more of Dorman's sketches on his website, both in this series and albums covering a wider range of subjects.

My own comment on Liberty Hall is fully captured in this visual (not in the exhibition !).

What Nelson Saw

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Five views from the top of Nelson's Pillar will give you some idea what Nelson saw at the dawning of every day. While the camera was not of great quality the fact that they cannot be retaken may make them worth a look.

The first one above looks towards the Liffey as it flows past the relatively newly constructed Liberty Hall, the Custom House and the Gasometer. To the left you can see Michael Scott's Busáras.

I don't want to dwell too long on the first photo at the expense of the others, but, I gather there was fierce opposition to the construction of Busáras on the grounds that it would dominate the Custom House (front of, presumably). Nelson must have died laughing, from his vantage point, when he saw Dublin's first skyscraper rising on the west side of the custom house. Clearly a no contest in his eye.

The second one looks across at the Pro-Cathedral and the Department of Education. For me, it emphasises the backstreet location of the cathedral, compared, for example, to Christ Church or St. Patrick's.

The third shows the buildings on the north-east side of O'Connell St. with the landmark spire of St. George's church and the back of the houses in Cathal Brugha St. Note the shadow of the Pillar itself which we might have used as a sundial instead of the Millennium Chime in the Slime had Admiral Nelson not taken his leave of us by then.

The fourth one looks straight up the middle of the street, clearly showing the public toilets and mid-street parking as well as bringing in Findlater's church and the Rotunda tower.

The final shot moves a bit westwards, retaining Findlater's but showing the full of Parnell Square, including the imposing frontage of the historic Georgian buildings where the Rising was planned and which subsequently housed Coláiste Mhuire where I went to school. You can see Phibsborough church and also the spire of the Black Church where legend had it that if you ran round it three times and then went in you'd meet Old Nick himself.

Sauce for the Goose

This is the entrance to a 1970s housing estate. It has long had two Eircom boxes under the tree. Recently it was proposed to add a third in order to bring fibre-optic connections to the residents.

This was badly needed as current connection speeds for broadband on the land lines is appalling. You might as well nearly be on the old dial-up. While the speeds are clearly way ahead of what we used to get on dial-up download file sizes and bandwith have increased exponentially and contention ratios are a state secret. But it all adds up to serious frustration for the user.

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The Planning Authority, in its wisdom, refused permission for a third box on the grounds that it was not consistent with the aesthetics of the environment. A stable in Bethlehem or a site at the top of Calvary I could understand, but unobtrusive as it is in this location? Come on.

Fortunately, they seem to have finally relented, on appeal and in the run up to the local elections, and hey presto, box no.3. I wonder how many residents, other than those who saw it being installed, will actually notice it.

So could we please have some consistency in the approach to planning decisions, at least across the Northside.

Rosie's Bridge

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Today saw the launch of a booklet setting out the background to the naming of the Rosie Hackett Bridge. It includes an original essay on Rosie and some biographical details on the other four shortlisted contenders.

The launch was by Dublin Lord Mayor, Oisin Quinn, who not only paid tribute to Rosie but reminded us of the other unsuccessful but very worthy shortlisted contenders.

Councillor Dermot Lacey, who chaired the City Council's Naming Committee, explained how the final decision was made. There were 85 nominations and over 18,000 people made submissions in one way or another. Voting was by the Borda count method which operates on the basis of stated preferences and produces a single winner representing the maximum of consensus among the voters. Dermot claimed that this was a first for a public authority and he is nearly right as perusal of the Wikipedia link above will show.

Dermot is a great speaker, providing substance with entertainment, or is it entertainment with substance, and if ever the toastmasters run out of members, then Dermot is your man.

And he doesn't confine himself to mere speech. He played us the first public performance of a new ballad he has written for Rosie and her bridge and promised to donate the millions it would generate to Alone, an organisation looking after the elderly set up by Willie Bermingham, a Dublin firefighter who also figured on the bridge's shortlist.

And the worthy runners up will not be forgotten. The intention is to honour them, one way or another, in the future. But, as Dermot reminded us, you have to be very careful about this. Take Bram Stoker for instance. The East Link Bridge, which is about to revert to the control of the Council from the current private operator, could come up for renaming. As the Council, at this stage, intends retaining the toll on the bridge, calling it after Bram Stoker could give Dublin wits a field day, starting with "The Bloodsucker Bridge".

Clearly, the Lord Mayor is impressed with the new ballad and who knows, we might find him giving his own rendition at a future function - the opening of the bridge perhaps.

And these are the girls, whose vociferous and relentless campaign across the social media got the bridge for Rosie.

The Lord Mayor hears May O'Brien's reminiscences of Rosie. May was a stalwarth in trade union circles fighting for workers', and particularly women workers', rights. You can read one of these reminiscences in the booklet.

James Curry (right) who researched and wrote the piece about Rosie in the booklet, with brother and sister Bill and May O'Brien (centre) both of whom are well known for their trade union advocacy and leadership on behalf of workers, and Laura Paul (left) a friend of May's.

You can access the Dublin City Libraries' press release online including the PDF of the booklet itself. The booklet is a lovely production, as we have come to expect from Dublin City Council. I am lost in admiration for the cover photo/montage which succeeds in obscuring the hideous Liberty Hall, no doubt in deference to Rosie who was strongly opposed to the destruction of the original building.

The bridge will be opened on 20 May 2014 and James will be giving a talk on Rosie in Liberty Hall on 19 May 2014.

Locked Down

Liberty Hall
Locked down for the Lockout

- from the top of the No. 15 bus
on Tuesday 8th October 2013.

Anarchic Market

I was tickled pink by the above poster. "I must do a post on this" I thought. And here I am doing it.

But just what was it that really tickled me about this? It was some stray thoughts that I'm finding it hard to put into words.

Do people queue at such a fair? Do they pay for the books? Do they grab a pile of books and run out the door? Do they blow up the fair premises? And, can you really learn anarchy out of a book by doing what someone else tells you to?

I should mention also that this particular poster was outside Leinster House, seat of the Irish parliament.

Something in that muddle of thoughts made me smile when I saw the poster.


You can check out the event for real here.