The Independent.ie reported on Friday that Dublin has a new “district” and it surprised and puzzled me. I thought one of the fringe areas on the outer commuter belt might have got a new name, but, NO, they were writing about the “new district” called “Dublin One”. What?? A new district? Sounds like a whole pile of bullsh*t….and so it is!
Nearly a year ago, in January 2016, the Dublin Northside Attraction Alliance was founded and it seems that they have done close to nothing for the whole year. They started very confused when they included the Guinness Storehouse in the Northside list of attractions. (You better claim the biggest visitor magnet in Dublin for the Northside even if it is firmly on the Southside!) A website is up but not much else seemed to have happened.
And when you think about it, it does absolutely not make sense to create a deeper divide than there is already. By creating an artificial separation between Northside Attractions and other attractions (there is no “Southside Attractions Alliance”), you don’t market the Northside better, but you fragment our quite small city more and create unnecessary confusion in tourists.
The right thing would be to market DUBLIN (as a whole) and ignore that there is a river separating North and South. So it was an ill-advised initiative to create the Northside Attraction Alliance, but instead of seeing that it failed, now they plan to make it worse:
Last week Dublintown, the trader’s organisation for Dublin, launched “Dublin One”, a new “brand” to promote the area west of O’Connell Street to Capel Street and Parnell Square to the quays. Dublin 1 is already a postal district and doesn’t require any brand. So why a new “brand” was created for a fraction of Dublin 1 is a mystery. Oddly O’Connell Street seems to be EXcluded from the Dublintown district “Dublin One”, it only starts “west of O’Connell Street” according to the website.
Irish Independent journalist Pól Ó Conghaile suggests in his article that it is a great idea. But to subdivide Dublin further instead of pulling together and to promote based on merit and quality rather than on location can’t be a great idea. He mentions some of the highlights on the Northside and while he doesn’t claim it, it could appear that he implies that they are all in “Dublin One”, but they aren’t! Many of the sites he mentions are in Dublin 7 (e.g. K Chido Mexico, Old Jameson Distillery, the old Victorian Fruit & Veg Market).
No, Dublintown, “Dublin One” that only covers part of Dublin 1 and that is intended to discriminate some areas by elevating one small part of Dublin doesn’t make sense! It’s just odd!
