“A force bigger than life itself,” said a eulogy by O’Neill’s friend Carmel Jennings. “Working-class warrior,” said Rita Fagan, another friend of O’Neill’s.
“I think it’s reaching a tipping point, that me and like-minded colleagues have been banging the drum for so long saying, we need to try something different, rather than keep doing the same.”
Even before councillors blundered and failed to pass a local plan for Phibsboro, some local residents had been knocking around the idea of inviting experts in to draw up a grand vision for the area.
