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Category: Dublin City Council

Dublin City Council: Are they all insane? – Clontarf Sea Wall

13 January 2018Written by Joerg Steegmueller

There are (too many!!) times when you have to question the sanity of the people that run Dublin City. Last week I wrote about the mess regarding College Green Plaza. Dublin City is definitely involved in that, but An Bord Pleanala was also a significant contributor to that mess.

This week it is getting worse. Much worse!

You might remember a big fight between Dublin City and locals in Clontarf about the flood protection wall that was built last year. The locals wanted to have a low walls so that their pretty views of the sea will not be disturbed and Dublin City banged their fist on the table and said: NO! The “No” was based on the expected flood levels and the Clontarf locals were the ones that appeared narrow minded and short sighted in that conflict. Dublin City went ahead and got the wall built and the locals had to accept.

Fast forward just little while to last Monday: In their January meeting, the Dublin City Councillors decided to LOWER the sea wall now by just 30cm for a cost of EUR 230k below the level that is the national flood level standard to …wait for it…. “improve the view for motorists”. Have you heard anything more bonkers from the shower of City Councillors? But that’s not all! After that it will cost another EUR 300k to beautify the shortened wall. And it is also expected that the wall will have to be raised again in a few years time.

The interesting thing is that Labour, the Green Party, some from Fine Gael and some from AAA-PBP were against the shortening of the wall, but the decision was 34 in favour and 21 against, 3 abstained. In the Council with 63 councillors there are 8 from Fine Gael, 8 from Labour, 6 from AAA-PBP and 3 from the Green party. That’s 25 who should have been against it (obviously the parties weren’t able to convince their own councillors).
And what parties are on the INSANE side of the house? It is Sinn Fein (16), Independents (11), Fianna Fail (9), Social Democrats (1) and Workers Party (1). Remember them when the next election comes along in 2019!

At the time of writing this, the minutes were not yet published. so a list of names who voted for and who against is not known and the above paragraph is a guess from the above referred to article in TheJournal.ie. If you want to watch the webcast, you can find it here and look for Topic No. 6.

Dublin City Council, Odd, Politics Clontarf Sea Wall, Fianna Fail, Fine Gael, Independents, insanity, Sinn Fein

College Green: Traffic Calming vs Traders – Dublin City Mess!

06 January 2018Written by Joerg Steegmueller

What a mess! With the new Luas passing Trinity College at College Green and needing traffic priority, the buses and taxis that are also still allowed to use the street are causing some problems, so Dublin City Management lead by the Dublin City Manager Owen Keegan would love to close down College Green immediately even before a decision has been made about the new College Green Plaza and the planned 10mio regeneration of the area.

The Planning Authority “An Bord Pleanala” has to decide on projects like that and Dublin City Council applied in May of last year for permission to build this traffic-free plaza and ban ALL traffic (including buses and hopefully taxis) from access to Dame Street. An Bord Pleanala was meant to decide in November, but in August the planning authority ordered a “comprehensive assessment” after they must have received submissions from organisations that had concerns (e.g. Dublin Bus, the National Transport Authority and traders in Dublin.

Dublin City submitted their assessment in October, but then Bord Pleanala ordered that the public should get full visibility of the results and should be allowed to make further submissions. This public hearing was planned for next week. However on Thursday An Bord Pleanala notified the parties that were meant to be involved in that hearing that it will now NOT go ahead. It seems that the organisation that is tasked with making sure that people stick to (planning) rules made a mistake with rules about consultation periods and it is now unclear when the hearing will happen and when An Bord Pleanala will make a decision.

Originally Dublin City Council wanted to have the new plaza in place by the time the LUAS line opens. It is questionable if that was achievable, but the LUAS is running and we are in a huge mess regarding the College Green Plaza plans.

Owen Keegan, who seems to hate cars, now wants to ban buses and taxis from College Green even before a decision about the College Green Plaza is made and he gets strong support from Green Party Councillor Ciaran Cuffe who recently fought hard against busking in Temple Bar and who always seemed to have favoured bikes over cars.

So does it make sense what they are fighting for? The answer is YES and NO. Private cars are already banned from College Green, so the question is if buses and taxis should also be banned and I would say NO to the ban of buses and YES to the ban of taxis. Taxis are nothing else but private individual transport with the difference that they are temporarily hired instead of owned by the passenger and they should be treated that way. Buses on the other hand are public transport vehicles in the same way as the LUAS and bus drivers also don’t just suddenly stop in the middle of the street as taxis do, so I think there is nothing wrong with buses sharing the LUAS lane, but get taxis out!

However, there is another question: It could happen that the the College Green Plaza will never be realised if An Bord Pleanala decides against it, so should the Dublin City traffic decision not wait for the An Bord Pleanala decision?

It all looks like a BIG mess! …it is so big that I could easily have gotten something wrong in my description above, but I hope not!

oThe Irish Times wrote about it here.

Dublin City Council An Board Pleanala, Ciaran Cuffe, College Green, LUAS, Owen Keegan, Taxis

If you are the wrong person in your job….Homeless Scandal!

18 November 2017Written by Joerg Steegmueller

It’s tough out there for the homeless people in Dublin. I can’t imagine many people enjoying living on the streets, sleeping in shop entrances, being kicked out all the time and not having much of a chance to get back into “normal” life. Yes, many of the homeless are not making things easier for themselves by being addicted to alcohol or other substances, but when you think about the savings most people have nowadays, there are MANY people just one month away from homelessness.

It happens like this:
Unexpectedly your company fires you. That might be because they are restructuring or moving or closing down and possibly has nothing to do with your work. You don’t own your place, but rent it. You have to work until the last day of your employment and your employer doesn’t give you time to look for the next job/go to interviews. You have no savings because that was never your strongest point and the rent is so high anyway that you find it very hard to save anything. The job finishes but you have difficulties to find the next job. Maybe it is your skills, maybe your age, maybe the location, maybe your confidence, but things are not going your way and now the next rent is due and you can’t pay it. You will HAVE to move out. Some friends let you sleep on their couch. But soon you have used up all your friends and next you end up on the street.

We might think “This can’t happen to me.” but add some health problems or other issues and if there are no savings, many are just one months rent away from homelessness.

Would it be helpful in that situation if the people that look after the homeless have some understanding of the challenges? Maybe even have some empathy? We all agree that that would be a big help!

Unfortunately the head of the “Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE)” which also calls itself sometimes “Dublin Region Housing Executive” isn’t so full of empathy or understanding it seems. On Tuesday, Eileen Gleeson, the head of the DRHE famously said at a meeting of the Dublin City Joint Policing Committee on Tuesday

“Let’s be under no illusion here, when somebody becomes homeless it doesn’t happen overnight, it takes years of bad behaviour probably, or behaviour that isn’t the behaviour of you and me.” www.thejournal.ie/eileen-gleeson-homeless-3699069-Nov2017/

Years of bad behaviour?! She really has no clue! She really seems to think that all homeless people are addicts or incapable to live in a home.

But that was not all! She also was talking about organisations that help homeless people and said “If they’re only getting a cup of soup and they’re homeless it isn’t helpful.”

Well, on a cold evening in the streets of Dublin, I would happily take a cup of soup and a sandwich if I was homeless and it could be a tremendous help to SURVIVE, so that I see the next morning when the snobs of the Dublin Region Homeless Executive tell me that it is all my own fault for being homeless. Unbelievable!

Eileen Gleeson was on the spot when she answered questions and made these statements, so sometimes we say things we don’t mean and use words we would/should not have used. In a very very supportive way and to help out Ciara Kelly on Newstalk offered Eileen Gleeson NUMEROUS opportunities to apologise, but there was no apology. She did say “To be honest, I could have probably used better language in trying to explain the point I was trying to make.” but that certainly doesn’t sound like an apology.

Can somebody who has so little understanding for her “clients” be the best person to provide good services????

Dublin, Dublin City Council, Politics, Society Dublin Region Homeless Executive, Eileen Gleeson, Homeless

The end of the Circus …as we know/knew it!

11 November 2017Written by Joerg Steegmueller

I don’t know when I was at a circus the last time. It must have been when I was 10 years of age or younger and I don’t know either if it was once or twice that I was at a circus, but it was definitely not more often.

So, I am clearly not a mad Circus fan and no Circus could build their business on people like me. But it did make a big impression on me. I remember clowns, and jugglers and a round sandy arena, but I also remember tigers and lions and elephants and possibly monkeys.

Thinking back, it was the animals and the clowns that impressed me most. I didn’t know if the animals were treated appropriately, but I was 10 and it wasn’t the first time that I had seen animals in cages or on leashes, so it didn’t concern me hugely. Since my circus visit back then, I have heard about mistreated animals, but I also have heard about circuses making huge efforts to look after the animals well.

Now it has been announced that from January 2018 the use of wild animals in circuses in Ireland will be banned and I am in two minds about it.

Obviously I am not supporting or condoning the abuse or bad treatment of animals (“wild” or non-wild!), but at the same time I remember the visit to a circus as a hugely positive and educational experience. I also wonder why only “wild” animals will be banned and if these “wild” animals are still that wild? What about a tiger whose parents and grand-parents and great-grand parents all were part of a circus. Is that still a “wild” animal? Or is it a “domesticated” animal. And why are ponies and dogs seen as different type of animals. They once were wild as well, I guess. And mistreating them is also not acceptable. We are training dogs with no hesitation to do tricks for us, but there is objection to train formerly wild animals.

Would it no have been an option to work on ensuring that no circus mistreats animals? I am clearly no expert in this area, but I am wondering.

Dublin, Dublin City Council, Events, Society Circus, Wild Animals

Catalonia Mess Spills Over to Dublin

04 November 2017Written by Joerg Steegmueller

Many years ago I met an elderly man from Catalonia who regularly left his home to spray political graffiti in favour of Catalan Independence on house walls in the town he lived. He was a nice man, but a nutcase at the same time. He did a good few other rebellious things as well. Nothing too big, but still his own bit of civil disobedience.

At the time I read some information about Catalan Independence and it just didn’t make sense to me. In an age where working together is 100 times better than working against each other, it doesn’t make sense to declare independence in one small part of a big country even if that part at the time is relatively wealthy. It doesn’t make sense in Belgium, not in Germany (Bavaria would love to be independent) or in Catalonia and it certainly also extends to the nonsensical Brexit. We don’t have to agree with the status quo, the current rules of engagement and we should improve these rules, but the only future the internationally extremely small countries in Europe have is if they will work together.

So, Catalan independence doesn’t make sense, BUT I think their current rules of engagement with the rest of Spain has to be looked at and should be improved. They called the referendum some weeks ago and it would have been really interesting to see a democratic result of that referendum not the skewed result that it had. But I was SHOCKED when I saw some of the pictures and videos about how the Spanish police acted against their own PEACEFUL Spanish neighbours. An absolutely unacceptable case of unjustifiable brutality. The Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has proven that he is a totally incompetent politician and suddenly I had some sympathy for the Catalan fight for independence. I still think it is ludicrous, but if that is the treatment you get from the central government, then you just HAVE to rebel to a degree.

It is nonsense to jail Catalan politicians and to accuse them of rebellion. A dialogue and a compromise has to happen! It can’t be that the rest of Spain will milk Catalonia, but it also doesn’t make sense for Catalonia to split from the rest. Madness on both sides!!!

But now the madness has reached us in Dublin!

John Lyons and Tina McVeigh from People Before Profit have put a motion forward in Dublin City Council to raise the Catalan flag on top of City Hall for a month to show Dublin’s solidarity with Catalonia. And a protocol meeting of Dublin City Councillors voted in favour of this suggestion with 7:5 votes. On Monday 04 December the whole council will now vote about the Catalan flag in City Hall.

Without a doubt the Spanish government is shivering in their boots with fear. Imagine if Dublin raises the Catalan flag, it might mean that Spain will have to give Catalonia the independence they want, because Dublin says so!! TOTAL nonsense!

But if councillors will vote for it, we will have to ask WHY only one month?! Maybe we could replace the Dublin flag with the Catalan flag for good? And why only the Catalan flag, I am sure there are other parts of the world where people are oppressed. The Palestinian flag was already flying over City Hall. But there are more countries or parts of countries that should get our support. Next John Lyons will suggest to fly the Cork flag over City Hall to support Cork’s quest for independence? Odd people in the City Council! :-O

Dublin, Dublin City Council, Elsewhere, Politics Catalan, Catalonia, Dublin City Council, Dublin City Councillors, flag, independence, John Lyons, Mariano Rajoy, People Before Profit, Spain, Spanish, Tiny McVeigh