Friday 6 May 2011

Dublin park open only three hours a day after 150,000 Euro facelift due to (fear of) anti-social behaviour

Flicking through a copy of the Northside People, I chanced upon an article that dealt with a public park which had opened in the markets area of town. Sort of.

You see, the park - refurbished by Dublin City Council at a cost of €150,000 - is only open between the hours of 12 noon and 3pm.

The reason? It seems the authorities fear anti-social behaviour.  This, despite the fact that the Bridewell Garda station is not even 100 metres up the road from the park.

What does it take to make the Irish authorities carry out their responsibilities?

It seems rather than deal with any instances of anti-social behaviour, the powers-that-be simply close down public facilities.  It is the same if you go for a drive in the Dublin Mountains, car parks are simply shut and people must leave their cars on the narrow roads.   Again, “anti-social behaviour” is the reason given.

So, we can conclude one of two things:

1) We have a super-strain of scumbag in Ireland, that no power on Earth could contain.

or

2) The relevant authorities – be they local councils or the civic guard – are simply not doing their jobs.

Tempting as it is - at first glance -  to plump for option one,  the second option is the only logical choice.  

If you are in any doubt, try counting the number of police on the beat in any of our known socially troubled areas some evening.   Or, less seriously, try parking your car in a (locked) public car park in the Dublin Mountains on a summer afternoon - while the shellsuits are still in bed only dreaming of forthcoming anti-social activities.

"With power, comes responsibility", the saying goes.   

Not if you are in a well-paid position of public "responsibility" in Ireland, it doesn't.

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7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Completely agree. The Liffey boardwalk in town is the same. I was in Dublin last weekend and went for a walk around the city. There were heroin addicts openly dealing. In the centre of town.

This could be a really nice addition to Dublin, the views are great along the river. Shouldn't be that hard for the Garda to move a few people on.

Eoghan

The Gombeen Man said...

That's right Eoghan. I've never seen the like of it in any other city I have been in.

It make me laugh to think what the tourists must think too... and the eejits in Failte Ireland seemingly oblivious...

Anonymous said...

Id go with a bit of both one and two myself gombeen man . We definitely have a scumbag master race of sorts here who are most definitely not in any fear of the powers that be .

anna said...

What about public toilets? Small towns in NI, Hilltown & Castlewellan Co Down, Crossmaglen South Armagh actually Have public toilets And they’re often open.
I came to Dun Laoghaire 14 yrs ago. It once had a Huge railway station: mostly now demolished, the main building now a restaurant. The Dart office was a tiny outhouse 150 yrs old on the platform,(the main old building had been sold/ rented to the restaurant) .No public toilets in station.
THEN 13rs years ago a shiny £1,000,000 station was built: takeaway coffee bar, shiny new toilets etc. Toilets all stainless steel, a sensible vandal proof idea. Addicts used them to shoot up, we were told. Purple lights ( making it hard to see veins) were installed and in Pearse.
Toilets remained open. I went away from 2005- 2009. When I came back, I could not find the Dun L station toilets- signs off the doors and they were Locked. Toilets in Pearse are still open tho - and the purple lights are gone.
Dun L is A Major ferry port. It's also still A Major rail station- many use Dart and trains to South coast towns and Rosslare ferry port BUT NO public toilets!
As GM man rightly says our public services are quietly withdrawn - as people won't do their job.
AS FOR THE PARKS!!! Has anyone used a loo in a park in the last 25 yrs? OK, there is a basic But very clean one in the small People's Park in Dun L ( Thank God I live in such an upper class town...at least if the rich never suffer diminished services, I won't either..oops did I say that out loud..anyway ..).
BUT there's ONLY an old locked up loo in Phoenix Pk- a park used by 100,000's . Only a locked up loo in Stephen's green- 2major parks, with Phoenix pk the largest enclosed pk in Europe!! None in Iveagh gdns. Warrenpoint, co Down ( pop. 10,000) has a lovely stainless steel loo in its small pretty park, BTW it’s Free( nearly all public loo s in the NI are) - and another clean free public loo on it's main square.
So WHY none in Dun L station ? well, the rich don't use public transport.
And maybe staff feel they’d have to chase off knackers. Yep, their DNA has mutated so they are a super strain , worthy of a Hollywood horror movie. But Why give in ???
I wandered into 2 picturesque old catholic churches, to see their architecture and design :1 near ,Mount joy prison,1 in the Liberties. Both has signs they had security cameras inside to deter anti social activity. BUT they were open. …SO why can’t public parks do the same?? I was shocked as I’d never seen that in Belfast ( o.K. I don’t frequent churches much), BUT at least they still opened.
Even Provide a limited service- with some caveats.
EG I wouldn’t even mind if Dun L station loos ran out of paper,soap- if they were open. Or even if they had big notices ,warning that in the washbasin area, there was a security camera - I wouldn’t mind , after all I hardly ever use a public loo for changing BUT , at least they’d be providing the basic service Most Europeans Expect. However, because Irish people’s sense of what basic public services Should be is ever eroded, they’ve got to the point they don’t seem to know that This TYPE OF DEPRIVATION IS NOT NORMAL OR TOLERATED IN EU!
I was mildly amused when 2 students, from @ Kerry/ Limerick moved into my house in Newry- and asked if the water was safe to drink! When I asked why, they said because in some places in this country it’s not safe to drink- well NI is not one of those. Hell, even rural south Armagh in the 1960s had clean water gushing from all its taps, whether in old stone houses or farm yards,. YET these well educated science students didn’t see anything wrong with their country having unsafe water in some areas.:
Anyone else for storming An Bastille? Demanding Open Parcs for na paisti ( agus an pobal in general): some ( open) little cabins in said parcs with ’ Fear’ nd ‘Mna’ marked on them- and of course clean Uisce overall. Toilets: Parks: Water- not much for a C21 European people to ask for , is it?

anna said...

What about public toilets? Small towns in NI, Hilltown & Castlewellan Co Down, Crossmaglen South Armagh actually Have public toilets And they’re often open.
I came to Dun Laoghaire 14 yrs ago. It once had a Huge railway station: mostly now demolished, the main building now a restaurant. The Dart office was a tiny outhouse 150 yrs old on the platform,(the main old building had been sold/ rented to the restaurant) .No public toilets in station.
THEN 13rs years ago a shiny £1,000,000 station was built: takeaway coffee bar, shiny new toilets etc. Toilets all stainless steel, a sensible vandal proof idea. Addicts used them to shoot up, we were told. Purple lights ( making it hard to see veins) were installed and in Pearse.
Toilets remained open. I went away from 2005- 2009. When I came back, I could not find the Dun L station toilets- signs off the doors and they were Locked. Toilets in Pearse are still open tho - and the purple lights are gone.
Dun L is A Major ferry port. It's also still A Major rail station- many use Dart and trains to South coast towns and Rosslare ferry port BUT NO public toilets!
As GM man rightly says our public services are quietly withdrawn - as people won't do their job.
AS FOR THE PARKS!!! Has anyone used a loo in a park in the last 25 yrs? OK, there is a basic But very clean one in the small People's Park in Dun L ( Thank God I live in such an upper class town...at least if the rich never suffer diminished services, I won't either..oops did I say that out loud..anyway ..).
BUT there's ONLY an old locked up loo in Phoenix Pk- a park used by 100,000's . Only a locked up loo in Stephen's green- 2major parks, with Phoenix pk the largest enclosed pk in Europe!! None in Iveagh gdns. Warrenpoint, co Down ( pop. 10,000) has a lovely stainless steel loo in its small pretty park, BTW it’s Free( nearly all public loo s in the NI are) - and another clean free public loo on it's main square.
So WHY none in Dun L station ? well, the rich don't use public transport.
And maybe staff feel they’d have to chase off knackers. Yep, their DNA has mutated so they are a super strain , worthy of a Hollywood horror movie. But Why give in ???
I wandered into 2 picturesque old catholic churches, to see their architecture and design :1 near ,Mount joy prison,1 in the Liberties. Both has signs they had security cameras inside to deter anti social activity. BUT they were open. …SO why can’t public parks do the same?? I was shocked as I’d never seen that in Belfast ( o.K. I don’t frequent churches much), BUT at least they still opened.
Even Provide a limited service- with some caveats.
EG I wouldn’t even mind if Dun L station loos ran out of paper,soap- if they were open. Or even if they had big notices ,warning that in the washbasin area, there was a security camera - I wouldn’t mind , after all I hardly ever use a public loo for changing BUT , at least they’d be providing the basic service Most Europeans Expect. However, because Irish people’s sense of what basic public services Should be is ever eroded, they’ve got to the point they don’t seem to know that This TYPE OF DEPRIVATION IS NOT NORMAL OR TOLERATED IN EU!
I was mildly amused when 2 students, from @ Kerry/ Limerick moved into my house in Newry- and asked if the water was safe to drink! When I asked why, they said because in some places in this country it’s not safe to drink- well NI is not one of those. Hell, even rural south Armagh in the 1960s had clean water gushing from all its taps, whether in old stone houses or farm yards,. YET these well educated science students didn’t see anything wrong with their country having unsafe water in some areas.:
Anyone else for storming An Bastille? Demanding Open Parcs for na paisti ( agus an pobal in general): some ( open) little cabins in said parcs with ’ Fear’ nd ‘Mna’ marked on them- and of course clean Uisce overall. Toilets: Parks: Water- not much for a C21 European people to ask for , is it?

anna said...

..and incidentally on my week end trips over the last 2 weeks I discovered the toilets on Greystones stn platform are now Locked- and no signs on the doors- BUT the ones in Bray ( one of our nation's drug capitals ) are still Open...puzzling that...

The Gombeen Man said...

It's mad, isn't it? Keltic bladders made of Kevlar. The only public jacks I know is Skerries.