Horsing around among the Luas trenches

The Minister for Transport was given a choice of dates but still chose to decline the invitation. Wise move, Mr Brennan, a man clearly long enough on the road to get the whiff of horse manure even at a distance.

Had he accepted Noelle Campbell Sharp's invitation to an exhibition of Philippa Bayliss's affectionate paintings from the Smithfield Horse Fair, he would have found himself positioned amid Harcourt Street's Luas debacle, roughly nose-to-nose with Jack, a lively five-year-old black cob, and yielding up enough pictorial hostages to fortune to last a decade.

The Minister was not the only one who declined to play ball for the Origin Gallery's preview. Ms Campbell Sharp's bête noire, the Railway Procurement Agency, refused to remove the barriers and fencing for the occasion, "for safety reasons".

Still, to the casual observer, the tram side of Harcourt Street is in better shape than a few months ago. True, says Mr Frank Dempsey of the local traders' association, but the hammers will soon start on the other side of the street. The traders are between a rock and a hard place, torn between broadcasting their distress and deterring the hardy patrons still prepared to negotiate the trenches to get to them.

Their militancy, however, is taking concrete form. Next week, traders will decide on a legal team for a class action suit and engage an engineering firm to prove "that the whole job was done in an unreasonable manner", says Ms Campbell Sharp.

At a meeting a few weeks ago, a group of traders decided that they would withhold their rates. The Odeon Bar and Grill alone pays around €52,000 a year. Harrington Hall, an upscale guesthouse where suites cost €275 a night, pays some €26,000. Ms Campbell Sharp reckons the shortfall for the council could be €8 million to €10 million.

The Odeon, with its 140-foot terrace, should have been poised to rake in the profits of the long, hot summer. Instead, said director Mr Derek Phillips, the dust made outdoor eating impossible.

For Mr Henry King of Harrington Hall, the last straw was the collapse of the road during the summer, and the "spin" put on the reasons behind it. The street was closed, preventing access to the residents' car park, a key facility.

"We survived the first year's trading, we survived September 11th, and the Gulf war. But can we survive Luas?"