I’m sitting on the 122 bus on my way to college from Cabra. I’d left with 50 minutes to get to my first lecture, but the journey suffers unpredictable delays as soon as it passes Phibsborough church. Phibsborough. The promised land, the land of the free, of true and classical Dublin, of Joyce and de Valera. Time Out magazine decided to bolster claims like these, claims of landlords with greedy agendas and LovinDublin, by listing the suburb on their list of the “50 Coolest Neighbourhoods in the world”, and as the bus is stalling I read about the area’s “minimalist Australian outpost” cafe, its “watering hole” craft pubs and the potential to take a peaceful morning walk along the Royal Canal.
I look up from my phone and out the window, and of course my bus has only crawled a few more meters towards the junction at Doyle’s corner, a pub of historical importance that’s been bought out by a chain and is now marketed as a high-brow whisky speakeasy. As we edge closer and closer to the terribly managed crossroads, I get a good look at seven or eight shuttered shop-fronts decorated with to-let signs, rusting in the morning drizzle as they have been for countless months prior. A woman sits on the ground outside the local post office as she has done on every trip to the city centre I’ve made since moving to Cabra, clothes at her feet. When we finally reach the junction the behemoth that is the grey, brutalistic mass of Phibsborough shopping centre shadows the main street from the early morning sun, casting a dull gloom on those who don’t have the time or money for slow-cooked porridge or overnight oats.
The picture that’s now being painted of Phibsborough depicts a select few short streets of red-brick Victorian houses, where residents can afford to rent or buy the property rather than the flat – in fact, there are some houses ever so slightly west of the area that are only as expensive as some single rooms on Munster Street. The community featured in the narratives of publications such as Time Out are a minority. They’re those who can fill their days with Two Boys Brew, who can lend their time and wages to brunch and to after-work drinks in the Back Page. There’s been plenty of encouraging work done for the area by these residents and some businesses in the community (such as Phizzfest, a celebration of culture and the arts) with the intention of rejuvenating the area, but the outcome of these attitudes and priorities have resulted in the majority of Phibsborough residents feeling disillusioned and alienated from their hometown’s amenities, fearing being priced out and sidelined in the very near future.
It’s easy for those readers who don’t live nearby to overlook this as any modern depictions of the area skirt smugly around these issues
Phibsborough, along with the neighbouring Broadstone, has a complex history of social problems including sex-trafficking, abuse of drugs, and homelessness, as many areas in the vicinity have. It’s easy for those readers who don’t live nearby to overlook this as any modern depictions of the area skirt smugly around these issues. Walking through the suburb myself, working a job minutes away and speaking to friends and relatives of mine who’ve lived in or beside Phibsborough all of their lives, it is abundantly clear that these problems are still rampant, and in some sense are getting worse as they’ve been painted over in off-whites and royal blues. Outsiders of the “hipster scene” are being made to disappear to the public eye, and so these social and economic issues are less likely to be addressed or resolved. The rigorous and instantaneous gentrification that’s occurring has priced residents out of meals and drinks in their old favourite pubs, their rents raised with no tolerance or concern for their struggle, but all is sunny in the land of micro basil and craft brews.
Those who call the walk down the Royal Canal a peaceful one have strolled blindly past the sinister graffiti of the walls of the prison, tales of struggle in the area, of the discarded syringes and the broken bottles, of the derelict factory and its squatters who’re ignored. The praise of an area on the basis of its upper-class eateries and houses valued around the half-million mark causes an attitude of complacency towards the dire need for better basic services and treatment of those who need them and desperately want them.
Where is the promised renovation of the crumbling shopping centre from the government while bourgeois cafes are selling their wares at unaffordable prices for many locals?? It’s been countless years, and though a €50 million plan has been approved by Dublin City Council, the improvements scheduled focus on drawing a new class to the area, not improving the lives of those who are already living there. Plans for the centre have been circulated online featuring long halls of cafe and restaurant spaces and accommodation for 341 students in a seven storey block, none of which provides relief for current residents. The same can be said of the original hipster haven, Stoneybatter – none of these streets are what they seem when the cafes close, when last call passes in the pubs, when the linens are pulled over our eyes for the night. The writings of trendy cultural publications on these areas only improve the lives of privileged minorities and not the masses, and rob both the working class and those others in greater need of the attention they deserve and often so badly require.
The praise of an area on the basis of its upper-class eateries and houses valued around the half-million mark causes an attitude of complacency towards the dire need for better basic services
Those who want to see Phibsborough a more creative, safe and lucrative place are not in the wrong, nor are many of the businesses in the area – it’s the publications and media outlets that ignore struggle that are, those who class-wash entire suburbs and exclude the many to further the few. It’s the landlord’s heartlessness and greed and the government’s ignorance, and it’s how the three play into each other that damage the many the most.
There’s nothing “cool” about a community ignored in favour of a rose-tinted front-page. My earliest memories of Phibsborough are going to see Bohs play with my dad, a semi-pro team the whole of Cabra and Phibsborough unite over. The team have been promised a renovation to their stadium for years now, but instead plans were announced recently to knock down the majority of Dalymount Park and all of the history that goes with it, in favour of a sterile new stadium to share with another team along with the glossy shopping space, likely resulting in price hikes and further alienation of locals. Bohs fans call themselves the Gypsies, and looking on at imminent rising rents, living costs and property pressures, the Gypsies may be forced to move on once more.
Correction: 15:52, October 21st, 2018
An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Dalymount Park is to be knocked down. In fact, the ground will be partially knocked down.
