Meanwhile, In Ballymun

at

Ballymun, Dublin

Sean Finnan, in the Dublin Inquirer, reports:

“Yeah. We’ve no pubs in Ballymun,” says [Patricia] Mulready. “No pubs and no shops.”

“Ballymun is gone,” says [Dinagh] Neeson.

Both women say the fact that the last pub is now done is symptomatic of the wider malaise in the town, where social life for all age groups has been hollowed out.

“No shops, no pubs, no entertainment for the kids, we’ve to go on the bus to the bingo,” says Neeson. “There’s nowhere to socialise.”

“This is why the young fellas are getting into trouble,” says Neeson. They’ve nothing to do.”

. . . “A good-quality pub with food, and a meeting space, is seriously lacking in the town, and is important for both business and social life, [Head of Ballymun4Business Robert Murphy] says.

Nicola Keating, who lives locally and works in the Axis centre, just across the square says she agrees with Murphy.

“There was a big theatre show on recently in Axis, she says. The actors asked after where they could go for a drink, and maybe a bite to eat.

“We kept them here and we gave them drink here but we couldn’t feed them. Well, I gave them crisp sandwiches,” says Keating. “It’s embarrassing.”

Ballymun Should Have at Least One Pub, Local Residents Say (Sean Finnan, Dublin Inquirer)

Meanwhile…

Pic: Dublin Inquirer

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33 thoughts on “Meanwhile, In Ballymun

    1. Tom

      The free market has spoken and decided it’s not worth the hassle. Blame your neighbours.

    2. Rob_G

      From the (very short) article

      “That closed down because of trouble,” she says. “The guards were outside every night of the week.”

      1. Al Bin Man

        Yes the guards are very boisterous when they get drink in them. Need to keep them out the back when they’re in that state

  1. Jeffrey

    I would argue that the reason why there isnt anything left is because of the anti social behaviors in the first place!

  2. Spaghetti Hoop

    According to the article, the pubs closed due to anti-social behaviour, more people drinking at home, and high rents in existing commercial units. It also explains the absence of pubs is down to the unfinished re-development of Ballymun.

    Which indicates that the existence of any one of these factors makes it futile to address another factor.

    1. George

      It caused by this one: unfinished re-development of Ballymun

      Along with the original bad planning in the development of Ballymun.

      They sell beer in IKEA though.

    2. Cian

      The two pubs in the shopping centre closed for an abortive redevelopment, piling everyone in to the one remaining pub in the hotel which just concentrated any issues. With the Swiss Cottage also gone now there is a vast, vast area of the city with zero pubs. Axis has a theatre drink licence but you need to be going to the performance and it has to stop serving after it – and I get the impression it doesn’t serve at all.

  3. Joe Small

    No shops and no entertainment the Dublin Inquirer quotes someone saying. While the area is deprived it does have a Supervalu and a swimming pool – that’s more than many Dublin suburbs. I was in the Ballymun library a few months ago and it was empty – no one uses it. My own local library is always full of kids and older people reading the papers or going online.
    Nothing is that black and white. I think there’s a certain sense of victimhood that goes with the all-too-real social problems there.

    1. Termagant

      They have a plaza, where I grew up we had no plaza
      They have a community garden, we had nowhere to put a community garden
      GAA within ten minutes walk of the centre
      Pub ditto
      Theatre

      I think these people are just trying desperately to find someone else to blame for their kids turning out to be gurriers.

  4. Anomanomanom

    I love the old line, that’s why they get in trouble, No its not. They get in trouble because their little scumbags. We had one football pitch which was literally a big square of tarmac with lines painted on it. We never acted how some of the youths do now.

      1. Anomanomanom

        Yes but we painted it in the blood of the animals we hunted, as we were to poor to go shopping.

    1. Dr.Fart MD

      i grew up in the early 80s in a small village and all we had was the gaa pitch in the school, but whenever we went to play on it the local guard came down and booted us off coz it was foreign sport. we used to pretend to play gaa when we’d see him comin, then back to soccer after. but he’d usually either catch us or boot us anyway.

  5. gringo

    Sounds like the people of Ballydung have become too dependant on the State for everything. Get up earlier folks.

    1. Spaghetti Hoop

      The article seemed to suggest that the kids had nothing to do because there were no pubs!
      I just found the entire piece a confused jumble of quotes from various Ballymun residents without any stats, facts or editorial binding. And I normally like the Dublin Inquirer articles so that’s not a criticism of the entire set-up.

      1. Hector Ramirez

        The reason I asked is I’d be surprised if there wasn’t. And in my (probably unpopular) opinion this is half the problem, even when so much is put on, some of the youngsters will still do what they want unless the parents are engaged in their wellbeing..

  6. Andrew

    Learned helplessness.
    Swimming pool, library, top GAA club, DCU facilities down the door the road. Subsidised housing a short bus journey from where most of the employment is in this country.
    Welfare dependency means Ballymun and a lot of other areas will never ever change.

    I worked there in the late eighties, early nineties,a small minority willing to help themselves, the majority were whingers with a serious sense of entitlement.

    1. Scundered

      A friend of mine worked for a sort of after school charity there, and the stories were horrific, parents too drunk to pick their kids up, kids wearing unwashed clothes for weeks on end, there were a lot of really tragic cases. They ended up buying a washing machine and dryer as the parents didn’t give a damn. So it’s easy to see how some grow up feeling angry at the world.

  7. Jibjob

    No shops? Gullivers Retail Park is around the corner: it includes a Eurospar, a Lidl, a McDonalds, a pharmacy, a pet shop, a Costa Coffee and other shops.

  8. Broadbag

    If only a pub would open all this anti-social behaviour would stop. Remember the halcyon days of Ballymun when the pubs were open and the local Garda station had to shut due to lack of crime? Remember!?

  9. John Doyle

    There was a lovely GAA park and a childrens play area (destroyed of course) now the little darlings fly around the park on motor bikes mummy is there on occasion giving sage like advice on how best to “take the corners” I’m not exaggerating.
    I’ve worked all my life got a good job no chance of ever having a home of my own, our politicians are corrupt were a vassel to the EU, I know lets build a pub!!!

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