Maria Atanacković first makes sketches of loose images that appear from somewhere in her memory. “Then I have to figure out how I’m actually going to make it.”
They’ve been asking for 50 years, says one local resident. And now the council owns a site that some councillors reckon would be a good spot to build one.
The council plans to sell it off to a private developer, as part of its strategy to create a super depot in Ballymun for its waste-management services.
It is up to the government to intervene to make sure an agreement for 900 social and affordable housing units in Poolbeg doesn’t unravel, said Dublin City Council Chief Executive Owen Keegan.
A government-backed effort to regenerate the area has been asking big firms at the International Financial Services Centre to hire locally. So far, it’s had limited success.
Independent Councillor Vincent Jackson says he has been pushing for a refundable deposit scheme since 1995, but that the response from government to him has been that it “doesn’t suit”.
“What you have here is a late-19th-century design in a modern setting,” says local resident John O’Reilly, of the compact green and narrow roads around it. “So everyday it’s a clog.”
