In Ranelagh, community groups longingly watch long-empty restaurant space

Just inside the entrance to the Ranelagh Luas station, black plastic sheets blocked out the windows of an old restaurant space.

They covered the front door and the long rectangular glass panels that curve along the steps up to the tram.

Formerly, the space was rented to Pinocchio, an Italian restaurant, which also operates a branch in Temple Bar.

But, on Friday, the interior was stripped bare.

The restaurant’s old sign had been up in the window until October. Although Pinocchio had vacated the property a good while before that.

It’s been closed for a couple of years now, says Philip Daly, chair of Ranelagh Community Response, a local initiative supporting elderly and vulnerable people in Dublin city’s south-east. “I’d went in ages ago. A good few times.”

The kiosk is owned by Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), the state agency.

They had been renting it out, said Daly. “I don’t know what happened. But I expected something good would move into it.”

It shouldn’t be out of use this long and really ought to be given over to a community enterprise given its location and accessibility, he says. “You could even give a six-month lease on a soup kitchen there at night.”

Pinocchio hasn’t responded to a query sent on Friday asking why it had vacated the kiosk.

A spokesperson for TII hasn’t responded to queries sent Friday asking why the restaurant had closed, or whether it had any future plans for the space.

A corner of neglect

Fianna Fáil Councillor Rory Hogan, who has been trying to chase down an explanation for the vacancy, hasn’t heard anything from TII either, he said.

“There needs to be some action to get it moving, and if they’re not doing something, I want to make sure there is a credible reason for it,” he said.

It came up on doorsteps a lot in the run-up to the council elections, Hogan said. “People were mentioning how they’d like to see something going in there.”

Just across the street is 2 Ranelagh, a site which is on the Derelict Sites Register.

People are scrambling to get a site to set up a business in this area, says Hogan. “But there’s just this dereliction.”

Philip Daly, of the Ranelagh Community Response, says there is no shortage of social enterprises and businesses that could make great use of that space.

He points to the barbers and Ranelagh Arts, just across the street. “Their places do them, but they’re not much bigger than a toilet,” he says.

Meals on Wheels does breakfasts Thursday mornings, while FoodCloud, the surplus food non-governmental organisation, does work in the RCR’s hall in Woodstock Court on a Friday, he says.

“I don’t know what the kitchen is like in there, but [TII] could really let it be used as a base, and give it back to the community,” he said.

There are a good few people sleeping rough in the area, he says. “You could use it for a soup kitchen at night.”