We have something great in Ireland! All our four National Museums do not charge any admission charge. That’s the National Museum at Collins Barracks, in Kildare Street, in Merrion Street and in Turlough, Co. Mayo. This is a bit of a luxury that not many countries have. Sure, it is not really free because in the end we all pay for it through our taxes, but at least you can go there without paying as often as you want.
Collins Barracks is a huge site with only half of it open as a museum and the other half is storage for a huge amount of additional exhibits. Collins Barracks also has is – as a former barracks – on a huge site that has its own car park.
Until 2013 parking was free there, but due to budget cuts in 2013 it was announced that they would have to charge for parking and the fees were a very moderate
+ EUR 2 for 0-3 hours
+ EUR 4 for all day parking.
That was still a good price and you could go to the museum for up to three hours for a low cost.
But last week on 19 May this substantially changed. The new charges are now
+ EUR 2 for just 1 hour
+ EUR 5 for up to 4 hours
+ EUR 12 for all day
That is a HUGE increase! If you assume maybe 2.5 hours for an extensive visit it will cost you EUR 5 instead of EUR 2 before. That’s 150% of an increase!! :-O
And no! Your taxes didn’t go down!
