Tone deaf - Village Magazine

64September/October 2015

ENVIRONMENT Wolfe Tone Park

FTER years of Dublin City

Council (DCC) vandalism and

neglect, its senior manage-

ment has conceded that that

the current layout of Wolfe

Tone Park which it manages – and

indeed designs – has not worked, and

redevelopment is being considered.

But are DCC capable of appropriately

redeveloping the park; and, can they be

trusted to?

Wolfe Tone Park is located on the site

of the old St Mary’s Churchyard: the

cemetery attached to the church on

Mary Street, opposite the Jervis St Shop-

ing Centre. For almost three centuries

the park served the community and its

visitors as a place to respect the dead

and, later, a place to embrace the living.

Local residents share fond memories

of the park as their childhood play-

ground and communal garden, while

photographs reveal the park as a popu-

lar sanctuary for respite in a busy

city-centre. However, with the arrival of

the Jervis Centre and a desire to extend

the success of Henry St as far as Capel

St, the City Council considered there

was an imperative to cater for com-

merce, and the tired shopper – more

than beleaguered inner city residents

The graves, railings and grass were removed from Wolfe Tone Park,

leaving it depressing and sterile. By Ciaran Flynn

Tone deaf

Wolfe Tone Park in the 1990s (left) and 2015 (right)

a popular Wolfe Tone Park in the 1990s (left) and

the redeveloped plaza in July 2015 (right)

the commonplace vandalism of relics in Wolfe

Tone Park by Dublin City Council

September/October 2015 65

whose voice rarely registers with usu-

ally suburban decision-makers. In this

case residents too were content with

changes in the belief that the walls and

railings conduced to “anti-social behav-

iour” and made it diﬃcult to police the

park. In the event, there has been no

diminution of obnoxious gatherings in

the park. The space and indeed the area

are so hostile to children and families

that it is inevitable there will be drink-

ing and the public carousing that

characterises much activity in many of

Ireland’s urban parks.

The slate was clean for DCC to rede-

velop the park into a faux

European-style plaza. In  the park

garden and railings were removed, and

the headstones, which had been

uprooted years before, re-arranged to

accommodate a bland, windswept plaza

furnished with a bleak array of concrete

plinths that serve as seating. The new

and voguish plaza was described as an

“urban beach” by Boyd Cody Architects

which won the architectural competi-

tion to overhaul the park for DCC, but

the grass that was its centrepiece has

long-since been removed by the DCC,

without any attempt to obtain planning

permission or to assess the environ-

mental impact. St Mary’s Church, the

oldest parish church in Dublin and one

of its most important buildings has been

converted to pub use, with drinkers

swilling over memorial headstones in a

Wren-quality building that deserves

more dignity.

Since , the park has been com-

mercialised and sterilised by DCC. Like

waves eroding a cliﬀ-face, under-at-

tended gaudy events and commercial

promotions consume what remains of

the park. One TV production, ‘The

Box’, did enough damage to warrant the

closure of the park to the public for

three months as the last solitary wedge

of grass was removed to make way for

the brown desert-like deposit that can

be seen there today.

However, applying the cautionary

theory of the broken window – where

tolerance of a single act of vandalism

encourages others to vandalise – DCC

cast the ﬁrst stone.

DCC continues to renege on a 

commitment to restore the park while

facilitating and eﬀecting damage to, and

disparagement of, the relics of the origi-

nal setting.

Many of the headstones around the

Just Green

‘Jervis St’ Park

“

66September/October 2015

ENVIRONMENT Wolfe Tone Park

park have been defaced, and some

broken by DCC’s own vehicles; other

vehicles are permitted to join in the

destruction while conducting typically

tasteless events. Reports of infringe-

ment to DCC are met with apathy; we do

not know of a single resident complaint

or concern that has been heeded by the

council in relation to Wolfe Tone Park.

For years the park has been used to

house what is believed to be, a DCC staﬀ

toilet within a vandalised metal con-

tainer. DCC staﬀ occupy the parking

bays on the west side of the park; identi-

ﬁable by the branded vests draped over

the steering wheels.

A ‘Dublin City Centre BID [Business

Improvement District] Company Ltd’

(BID) information kiosk was wheeled

into the park, presumably from Henry

Street, and has been abandoned for the

past few months. The DCC litter helpline

failed to have the obstruction removed;

suggesting either a lack of willingness

or control.

Suppliers of goods and services to the

Church Bar regularly park their vehicles

on the north end, while ordinary resi-

dents and visitors anxiously await the

next time we are a few minutes late

returning to our clamped cars on Jervis

Street – that is, if indeed, we can ﬁnd a

vacant space to begin with.

Today the park is closed to the public,

hidden behind black hoardings and

beneath the stage of Dublin

Fringe Festival Ltd’s Spiegeltent;

another antisocial event that will broad-

cast ampliﬁed music into the homes of

residents living only ﬁfteen meters away

for the next three weeks. It is clear that

the park, which should be an amenity

for hard-pressed residents in one of the

least green parts of the city, is an inap-

propriate venue for events such as

funfairs and ice rinks, but despite

appeals and objections from local resi-

dents DCC have granted permission for

the Tiger Beer Dublin Fringe Festival

circus. Of concern too is that, after

months of objections and requests for

information, residents were directly

informed that permission for the event

had been granted only hours before the

circus rolled into the park. This would

suggest that the event was advertised

long before permission was granted, or

that DCC waited until the eleventh hour

to notify the residents that permission

had been granted for the ampliﬁed

music event that will run until at least

pm/am for three weeks in

September.

Perhaps deluded by group-think,

encouraged by internal back-slapping,

or empowered by commercial belly-

scratching DCC staﬀ appear oblivious of

their own contribution to the demise of

the park.

At a DCC/BID meeting in March, BID

members proposed that the park be

rebranded as “Wolfe Tone Square” in a

cynical attempt to lower public expecta-

tions of ‘the space’.

Discussions also took place about the

commercial value of ‘the square’ and the

idea of extending the park into a neigh-

bouring business that would accept a

rent from the council. This fee would, of

course, be oﬀset by other commercial

ventures proposed for the park. But why

would DCC consider another circus tent,

Spiegeltent, carnival, Ferris wheel, ad-

space, or coﬀee kiosk over a simple

garden park contained within tradi-

tional railings in an area deprived of

green space?

While some may suspect that DCCs’

failure to provide a public green space is

a carefully engineered softening-up

exercise to push through BIDs commer-

cial proposal, it might very well be the

case that DCC are just not up to the task

of developing or maintaining Wolfe

Tone Park.

In any case, Dublin City BID Company

Ltd (BID) should not be leading a pro-

posed redevelopment of a public space;

and DCC should surrender the public

asset, that they have destroyed, to the

Oﬃce of Public Works (OPW). The

handover should be simple: the OPW can

easily be found in Dublin, maintaining

St Stephen’s Green and The Phoenix

Park.

In safer hands the park walls and rail-

ings, still stored in DCC’s Marrowbone

Lane depot, should be reinstated, and

apologies oﬀered all around. The mes-

sage on Wolfe Tone Park and other

parks for DCC from those who actually

live in the inner city is simple: just green

them. •

For more information on the campaign

to restore Wolfe Tone Park visit

WolfeTonePark.com

Dublin City Council has parked its staff welfare cabin along Wolfe Tone Park, for years

the Park closed for

three weeks for the

Tiger Beer Dublin

Fringe Festival Ltd

Spiegeltent

September/October 2015 67

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