Parnell Square LAP
Parnell Square is also home to the Ambassador Cinema, Gate Theatre, Hugh Lane Gallery and National Writers Museum. A Framework Plan for Parnell Square was completed in 2005 by Howley Harrington Architects on behalf of Dublin City Council in association with the Office of Public Works, the Rotunda Hospital, The Gate and Academy Theatres, The Dublin Writers Museum and the Abbey Presbyterian Church. The plan aims to transform a square which “is undervalued, underused and under performing” and which also suffers from poor public perception.
Parnell Square will, during the lifetime of the plan, benefit from over €200 million of public and private investment. Dublin City Council has already completed the €12 million extension to Dublin City Gallery- the Hugh Lane Gallery.
The Plan recommends the following:
- Upgrading the Public Domain on all sides of the Square- Footpaths, lighting, trees and bus lay-bys to be upgraded to the same standards as those prevailing in O’Connell Street and on-street parking and bus lay-bys to be re-organised.
- An Urban Pergola and Sculpture Promenade on Parnell Square East to stretch from the Gate to the Abbey Presbyterian Church containing outdoor sculpture.
- Rejuvenating The Ambassador Theatre.
- Making the Garden of Remembrance more welcoming and accessible with a new gate from Parnell Square North and improved accessibility for all within the park
- Abbey Presbyterian Church (Findlaters’) to be accentuated by extended pavements and floodlighting
- To improve and expand the existing Dublin Writers Museum to become a National Museum of Literature
- New anchor use for the Coláiste Mhuire Site - possibly a luxury hotel
- New City Childrens Garden and crèche on the Northwest Corner very appropriately situated beside the Rotunda and Garden of Remembrance.
- There will be a new contemporary “Cabbies” shelter built on the location of former facilities.
Rotunda Maternity Hospital:
There was broad agreement with the Rotunda on the following:
- New four story buildings facing on the Parnell Square east and west with increased car park facilities. The ground floors to have appropriate commercial and public uses.
- A new public garden, recreating the original garden designed for the centre of the Square. This garden would be linked to all surrounding streets and to the Garden of Remembrance. This would create a possible new North South pedestrian route from the Hugh Lane Gallery, across the Garden of Remembrance, through the new Rotunda garden and through the historic hospital building onto Parnell Street.
The Plan is to be implemented in three phases.
Phase one, which will take eighteen months, will include improvements to pavements, roads, parking as well as installing decorative street lighting and planting trees. This phase also includes the flood lighting of the Church and the commencement of the improvements to the Garden of Remembrance entrance. This work will cost €25.6 million including the €12 million already being spent on the extension to the Hugh Lane Gallery due to open next year.
The second and third phases have longer timescales
Michael Colgan, Director of the Gate Theatre said
"Parnell Square was once an epicentre of cultural life in Dublin because of the vision of one man, The Rotunda Hospital founder, Dr. Bartholomew Mosse. He developed the area from nothing to one of the most sophisticated neighbourhoods in the city where nobility, gentry and ordinary people alike came to enjoy some of the best music Europe had to offer as well as a civic area devoted to the patronage of fine arts. Nearly 250 years later, we now have an opportunity for Parnell Square to be restored to its former purpose and glory".
Sean Harrington of Howley Harrington, author of the plan said
“Parnell Square is Dublin’s lost Georgian square. At the end of the great axis running from St Stephen’s Green through the rejuvenated O’Connell Street northwards the square has the potential to be the jewel of the north side of Dublin City."
In late 2008, work will commence on the siting of the Central Library in the Ambassador Cinema. This is a landmark project for the library service with a value of €8.3m and will further strengthen the cultural quarter developing at Parnell Square. The Central Library at the Ambassador will be a literary anchor in the O’Connell Street / Parnell Square area.
Posted by Reflecting City Team on Tuesday, September 16, 2008
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