Lonely Planet describes O’Connell Street as ‘troubled’
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The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk. With Aviva Insurance.
O'Connell Street has been described as troubled with visible drug use by none other than Lonely Planet. The publication talked about the street struggling with decline and with safety concerns persisting. And we've the author with us now, Fionn Davenport. You're welcome to the programme, Fionn. When you set out to write about O'Connell Street, tell me what you saw and how you described it.
I think it's what most Dubliners have been concerned about for, I mean, unfortunately, quite a long time. I think it's a city that during the day is a hive of activity.
What issues are currently affecting O'Connell Street?
There's loads of stuff going on. But then if you look around, you look up and there's a little partial dereliction. There's like undeveloped buildings. There's a sense that O'Connell Street has lost, you know, that faded grandeur. Once upon a time, this was Dublin's grandest boulevard, a boulevard that sits along the Champs-Élysées or the Unterwand Linden in Berlin, you know. And yet for quite some time, this is a street that has struggled to recapture its former identity. Lots of social problems, particularly once the sun goes down. And I think for me, it was just trying to reflect that as accurately and as fairly as possible.
OK, so how did you do this? I mean, did you go out there and try to have new eyes looking at the street when you were planning to write this?
I'm in town. I'm in town five days a week. I'm from Dublin. I live in Dublin. I walk O'Connell Street all the time. You know, it's not, unlike, say, for example, when you're writing about a city that you're not living in, you know, where you go and you visit, etc., etc.
What observations did Fionn Davenport make while writing about O'Connell Street?
This is the city that I live in. I'm reporting on the city, on my city. And I think it's important to say is that in no sense am I trying to do Dublin Down. I'm not. This isn't like a gotcha piece or, you know, and I think it's worth reading the description in its entirety, the entire chapter. Like, you know, I do describe it as a hive of activities during the daytime. It's busy, it's full of energy, it's a vital commercial and transport artery for the city. But then it's also worth noting something that we Dubliners recognise and that things change over the course of a day and O'Connell Street just isn't an exception. At night, it can feel like a very different place. You know, and I think that's something that I need to reflect.
I know you're and you've said there that it changes at night time, but your description of it during the day talks about there being too much traffic and that being disruptive. And then I see in reports about your article this morning, the shop owners are talking about people on scooters during the day wearing balaclavas, engaging in shoplifting. So it's not perfect in daylight hours either.
No.
No, no, absolutely not. But then, like, the thing is, Lonely Planet is a guidebook for visitors to Dublin. It's not a forensic social analysis of Dublin, the city. And so I can't, you know, and I have a certain amount of words and a certain amount of space. So what I try to do is I try to give an overall impression And again, I think it's really trying to be as accurate and as fair as I possibly can. Again, I'm not trying to do the city down. I'm not trying to create conversations like this one. But at the same time, I do feel that it's incumbent on me and I owe a responsibility to my readers to try and reflect exactly what kind of experience they might have when they come to Dublin.
You sound a little bit torn about it, like... Are you sad that that is what you feel you have to write about O'Connell Street?
Of course it is. I mean, I don't mean this in a kind of silly throwaway play. I'm a Northsider. My father was born 100 yards from O'Connell Street. Of course it's sad. I want to write that Dublin is one of the greatest cities on earth. And so sometimes, and as you know, I've written the Lonely Planet Guide since the 90s, so I've seen Dublin change dramatically over that time, both for good and, in fairness, also for bad.
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