COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF RATHFARNHAM AREA COMMITTEE

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

QUESTION NO. 11

QUESTION: Councillor A.M. Dermody

"To ask the Manager to confirm if Mount Carmel Park, Firhouse, Dublin 24 ought to have a Dublin 16 address, in circumstances where those Residents vote in Knocklyon at all State elections.  To seek clarification as to whether or not the Firhouse boundary begins after the lights at Morton’s pub on the Firhouse Road?"

REPLY:

There appears to be a number of distinct issues within this question as follows

1. The postal district for Mount Carmel Park, Firhouse, Dublin 24.

2. The boundary for Firhouse

3. Where residents should vote.

Postal districts: 

These are determined by An Post who use this system  as a practical way to organise local postal distribution. The Council has no input in this matter so it is not for the Council to state whether the postal district for Mount Carmel Park should be Dublin 24 or Dublin 16.

Firhouse:

Firhouse it appears is not a Townland, The origins of the name seem to refer to what was a small rural village, and Manor House  situated within the Townlands of Knocklyon  and Tymon South

The following is the definitive descriptions of defined areas for Firhouse as contained within  S.I. No. 13/1986 — Dublin County (District Electoral Divisions) Regulations, 1986. 

Firhouse-Ballycullen	That part of the County situated within a line drawn as follows:—
	Commencing at the junction of Ballycullen Road and Knocklyon Road; thence commencing in a south-easterly direction and proceeding along Knocklyon Road and Scholarstown Road to its junction with Stocking Lane; thence commencing in a south-westerly direction and proceeding along Stocking Lane and Killakee Road to its junction with Oldcourt Road; thence in a north-westerly direction along Oldcourt Road to its junction with Ballycullen Road; thence commencing in a north-easterly direction and proceeding along Ballycullen Road to the starting point.
Firhouse-Knocklyon	That part of the County situated within a line drawn as follows:—
	Commencing at the intersection of the River Dodder by the imaginary northerly projection of Knocklyon Road, thence commencing in a southerly direction and proceeding along the said imaginary projection, and Knocklyon Road to its junction with Ballycullen Road; thence in a north-easterly direction along Ballycullen Road to its junction with Firhouse Road; thence commencing in a south-westerly direction and proceeding along Firhouse Road to its junction with the entrance road to Mount Carmel Park: thence commencing in a northerly direction and proceeding along the said road and the footbridge north-west of number 20 Mount Carmel Park to its intersection by the River Dodder; thence commencing in an easterly direction and proceeding along the River Dodder to the starting point.
Firhouse Village	That part of the County situated within a line drawn as follows:—
	Commencing at the junction of Firhouse Road and Ballycullen Road; thence commencing in a south- westerly direction and proceeding along Ballycullen Road to its junction with Oldcourt Road; thence commencing in a north-westerly direction and proceeding along Oldcourt Road to its intersection by the River Dodder; thence commencing in a north-easterly direction and proceeding along the River Dodder to its intersection by the footbridge north-east of Mount Carmel Park; thence commencing in a southerly direction and proceeding along the said footbridge and the entrance road to Mount Carmel Park, passing west of number 20 Mount Carmel Park, to its junction with Firhouse Road; thence in a north-easterly direction along Firhouse Road to the starting point.

****Firhouse Village is fully contained within the Local  Electoral Area of Tallaght South while Firhouse Knocklyon & Firhouse Ballycullen are contained, fully, within the Local Electoral  Area of Rathfarnham

See also below an extract from A History of the County Dublin. The people, parishes and antiquities from the earliest times to the close of the 19th century. By Francis Elrington Ball.

This work covers almost all of Dublin and was originally published in six volumes (1902-1920).

Knocklyon
To the south of the lands of Templeogue and south-east of the village of Tallaght lie the lands of Knocklyon, on which, in addition to a castle now converted into a modern dwelling, are situated a village called Fir House and several country houses, including Sally Park, the residence of the late Mr. William Domville Handcock, author of "The History and Antiquities of Tallaght."

After the Anglo-Norman conquest the lands of Knocklyon, together with a great quantity of the adjoining lands now comprised in the south-eastern portion of the parish of Tallaght, were granted to Walter de Rideleford, already mentioned as owner of Merrion and Donnybrook, but seem to have before long reverted to the Crown.

Amongst the subsequent owners we find the Burnells of Balgriffin, the Bathes of Drumcondra, the Nugents of Westmeath, the Talbots of Belgard, Anthony Deering, and Sir Dudley Loftus Dr Rathfarnham. The castle of Knocklyon, which in the sixteenth century was stated to be in a ruinous condition, was occupied in the early part of the seventeenth century by Piers Archbold, son of Richard Archbold, of Kilmacud, and father of Gerald Archbold, of Jobstown. He married a daughter of Barnaby Relly, of Tymon, and like his father-in-law, was in religion a Roman Catholic, and maintained on his lands a schoolmaster of that faith to teach his children.

He died in 1644, and in accordance with a direction in. his will was doubtless interred with his family in the churchyard of Taney. About the time of the Restoration the residents on the lands of Knocklyon are stated to have numbered nine persons of English, and ten persons of Irish descent, occupying seven houses.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century the name of Fir House, then written Fur House, first appears as the residence of a family called Fieragh, some of whom were employed in the timber trade with Norway. It has been suggested that the name Fir House is a corruption of their name, and also that it had its origin in an inn, bearing the sign of a tree, which formerly stood in the village, but it seems more probable that the name arose from the connection of the Fieragh family with the timber trade.

Voting Arrangements:

Mount Carmel Park is included in Polling District Knocklyon 1 Register Book II (Firhouse-Knocklyon E.D. (Part of)).   This E.D. (Part of) comprised that part of the Firhouse-Knocklyon E.D. east and west of the Southern Cross Route – M50 containing the townlands/streetnames of Mount Carmel Park.   Electors used to vote at Scoil Carmel but are now assigned a polling place at Knocklyon (Knocklyon Junior School) since the last Polling Scheme was adopted in 2010 effective from February 2011.