COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

MEETING OF RATHFARNHAM / TEMPLEOGUE / FIRHOUSE / BOHERNABREENA AREA COMMITTEE

Tuesday, November 14, 2023

MOTION NO.4

MOTION: Councillor E. Murphy

To ask the Council to account for the overall upkeep of Ballycragh Park including the ongoing littering and anti-social behaviour issues, maintenance and upgrading of the pedestrian entrances and kissing-gates and the damage to bins in the park.

REPORT:

Ballycragh Park is tended to by Public Realm staff 3 to 5 times per week as required with tasks carried out there including playground and teen space inspections, repairs to park facilities and equipment as necessary, servicing of bins, litter picking and cleaning, grass and pitch maintenance, hedge cutting etc. Theses visits provide additional passive supervision for the park, if an incident was to occur the Council staff members would report this to An Garda Siochana. The Council would encourage residents who experience or witness such activities to also report these incidents the Gardai.

There are currently 6 litter bins located throughout the park and at pedestrian entrances. One bin was recently burned, and an additional bin was vandalised. The burned-out bin has been replaced and the damaged bin will be replaced in the coming days. A staff member has recently inspected the park and there was no litter visible, the park was noted as being clean, tidy and well presented. A number of nitrous oxide cannisters were noted and arrangements were made to remove these.  The grass needs to be cut at the present time however the ground is saturated and could not support large grass cutting machinery, the ground will have to dry and firm up before machinery can enter on it.  Many improvements have been made to the park in recent years including the installation of play and teen spaces, bulb planting, tree planting and hedge planting, approximately 1,000 square metres of footpath have been surfaced under the 2022 improvement works programme, installation of seating has taken place and grass meadow has been established. These improvements encourage more people to visit the park and this helps to provide further passive surveillance.

A number of issues were identified that need to be examined further and require remedial action.  The swinging element of the kissing gate at the corner of Killininny Road and Parklands Road is scraping on the ground and may be difficult for some to manoeuvre, this may need to be raised slightly.  A number of the older type bench seats have no solid base underneath and this needs to be rectified.  There is a small amount of graffiti on some of the bins and this needs to be cleaned off. A small number of trees have broken branches which need to be pruned and removed.   The perimeter hedge is encroaching on a number of the entrance gates and in these cases the hedge needs to be cut back.  All of these necessary works will be carried out over the winter period, anything considered urgent such as clearing of entrance gates will be prioritised.