When I enter college, swiftly making my way through the Front Gate because Dublin Bus failed me once again, I don’t see the Campanile ahead of me. Instead, I note the hordes of tourists — phones in hand — capturing their first view of the Normal People film set. Then, I observe the group of people blocking off the entrance to Regent’s House to line up for the Book of Kells tickets. Once inside the Arts Block, I waste another ten minutes queuing for the restrooms — not a single college bag in sight. Heading towards the seminar room, I hear another handful of students complaining about the “traffic” in Front Square. I leave my class, and — wouldn’t you know it — the cycle continues.
None of what was just outlined can be considered a one-off situation. In fact, the struggle has now become more akin to routine, one that most Trinity students quickly learn to accept upon entering university. When I retell this pattern to friends from outside of college, I am mostly met with a “woe is you” attitude — after all, I did sign up for this, and, yes, it does occasionally evoke a sense of pride in the institution I am attending. All this notwithstanding, there comes a time when all you can do is simply sigh with annoyance and keep going with your day. With recent conversations surrounding campus tourism and its impact on the student body making headlines, one does begin to wonder if any of this is, or ever was, normal.
A recent article from the University Times has been making the rounds on Instagram, detailing a confrontation between a DU History member and a member of Trinity security staff who broke up an “unauthorised tour of the campus” that the student was giving to her own family. Another article featured multiple students voicing their frustration with the state of Trinity tourism, which makes them feel at best uncomfortable, and at worst plainly unsafe on their own campus. These instances should not be boiled down to simply the reality of studying at Trinity. A historic campus shouldn’t mean being an unpaid extra in all the Ireland pictures Patricia from Michigan shows her family over dinner.
The contrast becomes particularly stark when considering the current status of Trinity’s Dual BA partner, Columbia University. Columbia shut the gates of their Morningside Heights campus back in 2023 in the wake of protests regarding the university’s complicity in the Gazan genocide. For three years, the campus has been closed to the public, which has led to backlash from local residents frustrated by the inconvenience the closure caused to their daily routine. New York City, together with Zohran Mamdani’s administration, is currently pushing for the gates to reopen, arguing that the shutdown is in violation of an agreement between the university and the city’s government. With the reestablishment of an open campus likely approaching in the near future, the Trinity population’s anti-tourist sentiments appear even more severe.
Both colleges seem to be pushing for an expansion of privacy for security reasons. Both campuses are also historical sites for their respective cities and amass millions of visitors per annum. The comparison, however, ends here. In fact, following in Columbia’s footsteps feels quite ironic when taking into account that the very reason the campus was shut off was due to the administration’s cowardly response to student activism. While shutting Trinity out of the Dublin microcosm appears to be desired by many, it simultaneously invokes a series of elitist solutions for the college.
The status of Trinity as an essential nucleus of Dublin City is one that the college obtained the very day of its foundation. In 1592, the location of the campus stood to the east of the medieval city walls, taking over the grounds of an Augustinian monastery. Yet, as the city kept expanding, so did its boundaries, now situating the Trinity campus in the heart of Dublin. There is no Trinity without Dublin, and there is no Dublin without Trinity. Shutting the doors to the public would mean shutting out the city that it is so indebted to.
Now, it is extremely crucial for students to be able to exercise their rights and feel at ease in a place where they spend years of their lives. This, however, cannot come at the expense of recreating the ivory tower it once was. It would be nothing but elitist and incredibly privileged to demand that the Front Gate be permanently closed over what is essentially an inconvenience. The stereotype of a posh Trinity student is still alive and well — let’s not feed into it even more. Imposing mandatory TCard checks would only further alienate mature students who already experience exclusion from the student body. Forgetting your student ID could come at the cost of missing your classes or even being cornered by security guards — the exact way that it is already happening in terms of campus “tours”.
It is nearly impossible to work around privacy restrictions on a campus that is made up of student accommodation on every corner. Even if access were to be restricted to the Old Library and the Book of Kells, those living in Front Square could still be potentially affected, and if there is one thing that Trinity is already failing at, it’s providing a sufficient number of on-campus beds. The conversations surrounding what can be considered Dublin’s cultural hub cannot assume the argument of private ownership versus public heritage, since Trinity — regrettably to some — is a public institution.
What appears before us is a very utilitarian conflict, and one whose origins are quite unclear. Do we want the freedom to show the campus to our loved ones? Or are we too annoyed with tourists infiltrating even the most private of spaces? One, unfortunately, cannot exist without the other, and in such a case, restrictions seem to be insufficient. As much as I despise the concept of a “greater good”, it really does seem to be all or nothing. If the students cannot take a tour of their own university, neither should anyone else. But if we do get an amendment to the campus tour policy, there’s really no choice but to suck it up and move on.
