It comes as an announcement of the end of traffic-free weekends on Capel Street and Parliament Street was met with strong criticism.
Updated: 5pm, 24 August
Dublin City Council confirmed on Tuesday that the traffic-free initiative on Capel Street and Parliament Street would be extended by four weeks and will now conclude on 26 September. Public consultation will commence next Monday, 30 August.
📢 We would like to announce a 4-week extension to the Capel St/Parliament St weekend traffic-free streets initiative. The initiative, which was due to finish this weekend, will now conclude Sep 26th. Public consultation will commence on Monday 30th August. #Dublin #CityRecovery pic.twitter.com/OZ6dVUc6q9
— Dublin City Council (@DubCityCouncil) August 24, 2021
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Dublin City Council (DCC) has said it will engage with stakeholders and elected members to see if the traffic-free weekends on Capel Street and Parliament Street could continue “if there is a desire” to keep the measures in place.
The council’s comments come after it announced through Twitter on Monday that this weekend will be the last for the pedestrianisation of the popular Dublin city streets.
Over the summer months, the area has been transformed to accommodate outdoor dining for the street’s restaurants.
As part of this, DCC made Capel Street and Parliament Street traffic-free from 6.30pm to 11.30pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.
This was initially for a period of six weeks but following the initial successful weekends, the council announced in mid-July that the practice would be extended to the end of August.
Over the last 11 weeks, more than 300,000 people have experienced the traffic-free streets of Capel St & Parliament St. This weekend is the final scheduled weekend so be sure to check it out! #Dublin #CityRecovery #Pedestrianisation pic.twitter.com/SxRtCYXr2E
— Dublin City Council (@DubCityCouncil) August 23, 2021
The decision to conclude the traffic-free weekends has been criticised by business owners, who claim that they weren’t told about the changes and “found out” the news on Twitter.
Panti Bliss-Cabrera, owner of PantiBar on Capel Street, said that the news was “absolutely enraging” as the practice had been a “massive, unqualified success” and called for the pedestrianisation to be made a permanent fixture of the area.
This is absolutely enraging. We were told that the pedestrianisation was a 6 week trial. It was HUGELY successful. Then it was bizarrely announced the "trial" was being extended another 6 weeks. Then another 2
ALL HUGELY SUCCESSFUL
And now this?!@hazechu @RayMcAdam @JanetPHorner https://t.co/3gEpqYUHig— Dr Panti Bliss-Cabrera (@PantiBliss) August 23, 2021
However, in a statement to JOE on Monday, Dublin City Council said that if there was demand for the practice to continue that it would explore how this could be done.
It said: “Over the course of the summer Dublin City Council (DCC) put in place a number of measures on Capel Street and Parliament Street to facilitate outdoor dining and city reopening, creating 1,300 square metres of extra public space.
“These measures included making a section of the street traffic-free 24/7 and also installing numerous buildouts which provide space for restaurants and hospitality businesses to operate on a seven-day basis. All these facilities will still continue to stay in place over the winter months and will be reviewed next year at an appropriate time.
“In addition to the above measures, DCC had also made Capel Street and Parliament Street traffic-free from 18:30 – 23:30 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights… DCC wishes to remind people that this upcoming weekend is the last of the scheduled traffic-free weekends, which had been agreed in July and communicated at the time to all stakeholders.
“If there is a desire to continue the traffic-free weekends, DCC will engage with the necessary stakeholders and elected members via the two relevant area committees and the City Recovery Taskforce to determine if this is something which can, or should, be continued and for how long.”
DCC also said it had already planned to undertake a public consultation exercise with the public, stakeholders and businesses in the area beginning next week to determine “what worked, what were the issues, and what people would like to see in this area in the future”.
“This report will be presented to the elected members for their consideration with options for how changes in these streets could be made more permanent subject to the appropriate process and further consultation,” the council said.
Main image via Leah Farrell/Rollingnews.ie
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