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Category Archives: Limerick

Limerick (virtual city of) culture

This is an excerpt from a dream (possibly a nightmare) I had last night.

What if we added a citywide chromakey feature to Limerick City. Chromakey is commonly known as green-screen or blue-screen, a technique widely used by photographers and moviemakers to modify a scene, mixing real and virtual (make-uppy) visuals. We could paint every ugly and derelict building with the selected colour; ugly-looking people, cats, dogs, cars, etc., would be ordered to be dressed or painted with the same colour. Then, the likes of RTE can superimpose whatever virtual landscape they want to support their message when making programs about Limerick. On a good day, we may add some visuals form Limerick 2030 (when the whole place is converted to a large shopping mall along the river Shannon, with a few rich and beautiful people strolling along). On a bad day, add some visuals from some battle zone or shot’m-up game. Or we can have virtual graffiti. Or just leave the undesired stuff blank.

That would leave room for re-branding.

Earth is moving also for Limerick City of Culture

I was delighted to follow the developments today in Limerick, culminating in the resignation of the CEO from Limerick City of Culture 2014. One down, a few more to go, before there may be a possibility to build a board and a structure that can actually see a successful year of City of Culture through. A proper board only needs one bean counter. I doesn’t need any Gombeen-men (or women). It needs people who are experienced culture workers, with roots in Limerick and with a global outlook.

A good working board should be able to multiply the State contribution of €6 million, raising funds from other sources, if the successful delivery so requires. A real board should be transparent, making a year-long experience of high impact possible.

Limerick City of Culture 2014 Public Meeting

It was a public meeting, following the resignations of the artistic director of Limerick City of Culture 2014, Karl Wallace and two of his co-workers.

Many of us at the meeting requested that the board of Limerick City of Culture 2014 take their responsibility and step down, or at least, that the CEO steps down. Over the past few days, all the bad headlines in media have been caused by the Board – not the culture workers or people of Limerick.

The honest questions from culture workers and members of the public were met with political platitudes, such as Pat Cox’s statement that Karl Wallace’s resignation “was only a bump in the road”. Cox also claimed that the board, altruistically, “works for free”. I think we need to see the full accounts and ledgers of Limerick National City of Culture 2014 Ltd if we were to believe that statement. From where are the €120,000 coming, to pay the CEO?

Limerick National City Of Culture 2014 Ltd (Company Registration Number: 533149) was set up on Tuesday the 24th of September 2013 in Limerick. The company’s current directors Conn Murray and Tom Gilligan have been the directors of 16 other Irish companies between them, 2 of which are now closed.

Are there Vogons in Clare County Council?

Vogon deodorant

A couple of weeks ago, our local community in Lisnagry and Annacotty in county Limerick discovered that our neighbour, county Clare, are planning to build a dual carriageway (what some would call a highway or cheapish motorway) straight through our local community. Their plans would require several houses to be demolished, farms to become unviable and the community segregated by a sacrifice on the altar of unlimited growth in road traffic.
Clare County Council claimed that they had made the plans publicly available already last year and that they had conducted at least one round of public consultation, which is really strange as none of us in the target area had any notion of this. Not even the farmers and landowners that the road would have a direct impact on (obliteration) had received any notice – no letter, no email, no carrier-pigeon, no nothing.
This, of course, reminds me of Douglas Adams‘ book The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, where Arthur Dent‘s house is about to be demolished due to the construction of a motorway and while Arthur is trying to protect is house, the Vogon Constructor Fleet arrives in the sky and shortly thereafter demolishes planet Earth. The plans for the new intergalactic route, for which Earth was an obstacle, had been exhibited for several years at Alpha Centauri 4.1 light-years away, on public display in a filing cabinet in the basement of the Galactic planning authority.
The pure arrogance of post-Celtic Tiger politicians is stunning. Having read all available documents (they are still holding back the Constraints Study!), it is very clear that they have extrapolated growth in traffic volume exponentially based on a few years historical data when cars were whizzing around paid for by pretend-money from some of the now defunct banks and trucks were rolling in every second with globalised goods to be consumed in an ever-increasing death spiral by the happy Irish consumers. It is just tragic that Clare County Council and the consultants they hired have completely missed the fact the Planet Earth have just passed Peak Oil and it would be time to consider alternative economies and different ways of living, for example, growing your own food, use a bicycle and stop buying cheap and unnecessary garbage products from far away factories filled with child labourers.

Un-Building

One of the main problems behind the boom-to-gloom economy is the illusion that buildings create value, or at least some kind of buildings. As I’ve written before, making things is crucial for our survival, but to keep making the wrong things for the wrong reasons is counterproductive, or put it more direct – stupid. Making things is good if these things are needed. If they are not needed, don’t make them. This applies to buildings as well. There’s no point building a garden shed if you don’t need it.
But more seriously, do we need more shopping centres in Limerick? I read in the Limerick Post today that the current Mayor of Limerick, Jim Long, wants more of the UK chains further dilute the viability of the few existing shops in the city.

“…my own preference here is for the Sainsbury, Marks and Spencer and the Asda chain, so successful in the North of Ireland.”

Now, that is the most stupid thing I’ve read, when said by a Limerick politician while the Limerick City Centre is decaying due to that the City and County have built an almost endless number of retail parks (what an oxymoron!) around the city. For each big chain store that opened along Childers Road, Ballysimon Road, etc., the local and often family run shops in town were forced to either close or relocate. You get what you plan for.

Parkway Valley chaos

Looking at the Parkway Valley area, there was a plan approved to build one of the largest shopping malls in Europe, which is totally insane when you consider that the population of the Limerick area is only about 140,000. The originally almost useless land on the east side of the Singland plane was envisaged to be worth multimillions if commercial rents and rates could be extracted for every square meter of soggy old flood plain. With the current state of the site, with massive unfinished concrete structures in place, the land is even worth less, and in my opinion it now has a negative value as the land cannot be used for anything sensible.

With the so called Opera Centre (which is a silly name), we still have time to do something more sensible. I think we should apply the term un-building to the site, which basically means to remove the derelict buildings and restore the land to a state where grass, trees and plants can grow, people can walk, play and breath and perhaps even have a few allotments for growing vegetables. Just imagine how inviting the city may look if the entrance to the city centre was green. By un-building, we open up all kinds of possibilities for the future while being able to enjoy the place now.

12 years

This afternoon, I finally handed over the Course Directorship for UL‘s Masters in Interactive Media to my colleague Cristiano Storni. It’s been 12 long and exciting years with between 10 and 17 graduates per year. We now have graduates in many different countries around the world, at work ranging from teaching to new start-up companies to the usual multinationals.

It’s also about 14 years ago we started to discuss the need for a postgraduate course like this. It’s amazing how quickly time is passing, as well as how technology has evolved.

>The Changing Sound of Limerick

>I’m just home after yet another evening’s excellent experiences. The TWEAK festival has had a very positive impact on the city, with the addition of tonight’s SOUNDINGS event. Still, tomorow I need to go and see the TWEAK exhibition in City Hall…