COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF LUCAN AREA COMMITTEE

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

MOTION NO. 7

MOTION: Councillor D. O'Brien

"That this Committee requests that SDDC reinstate the park benches and repair the foothpaths in Glenaulin park in Palmerstown. There is only one bench left in the park at present."

REPORT:

The provision of seating in public parks is desirable and would usually be considered an enhancement. However, this is not always the case and in many public parks, the provision of seating has resulted in unintended consequences. In many cases, this has proven to be so difficult to resolve that, regrettably, the only effective solution has been to remove the seating.

While seating serves a worthwhile function in a park, the antisocial element associated with park furniture is often completly counter productive. While there are generally few problems with park seating during normal park opening hours, after hours the seats become focal points for gatherings. These gatherings engage in a range of anti-social behavior including drinking, littering, graffiti, lighting of fires, burning of wheelies bins and often result in vandalism and damage to the seat itself. The fires result in footpath surfaces being damaged as is evident in Glenaulin Park where the only indications as to where benches were previously provided are the scorched and damaged sections of footpath. 

The provision of seating in Glenaulin Park has been attempted on a number of occasions in the past. Early seat installations were removed due to vandalism and anti-social activities. The last of these were removed in 2011 on the east boundary of the park near Rossaveal Court to deter loitering at night. Around that time, more vandal resistant stone benches were installed in an attempt to retain some seating for bona fide park users that would withstand the rigours of abuse and vandalism. regrettably, these benches have also been systematically vandalised beyond repair and have, in the interests of pulic safety, been removed. The future of the remaining bench is under review and it may be necessary to remove it also.

Given the negative experience over the last decade, it is unlikely that new seating will fare any better. However, the park will be re-examined to see if any locations can be identified where new seating might have a chance of success. 

The repair of the damaged footpath sections will be undertaken in the current year.