A chara, – Plans by Dublin City Council to increase the number of pedestrianised areas and limit the intrusions of private cars can only lead to a city that is safer, easier to navigate for walkers and cyclists and generally more attractive for both locals and tourists.
Thoroughfares in which cars – by their sheer size, speed and parking requirements – exclude all other uses could then become living public spaces with multiple uses.
A city is about more than the commercial transactions that take place within its boundaries; it involves complex cultural, political and social encounters and exchanges that cannot be measured using crude financial statistics.
Commerce is certainly one element of the life of the city, but objections by retail groups that “big spenders” will stay away belie a hopelessly one-dimensional, patronising and elitist view of citizens and their practices, and of the ingredients that can make for a vibrant international city. – Is mise,
SEAN SHANAGHER,
Stoneybatter,
Dublin 7.