[Host]
Hello, welcome to the Wild Ones Podcast. My name is Joanna. I am your host. I am the founder of Good De Cork and also the Curator of the Wild Ones Salon. This podcast was recorded at the last Wild One Salon held in November, 2022 at Maureen's. It was the last salon of the. The theme was I choose to challenge urban planning, urban design, and urban development.
So for this salon, because it was the last one, we did it a bit differently. We sent out an invite, an open invite at asking who wanted to share their thoughts. About this team and we had six people sign up to jump onto the soapbox and share their ideas. We got consent from four of the speakers to share what they had said in the salon.
First up is Michelle. Michelle is a multidisciplinary artist from Cork City. Michelle has an MA in architecture from C C A E. She recently made her directorial debut with the sprawling octopus of an Elevated highway, a short documentary film. She has also performed poetry at multiple festivals throughout Ireland and internationally.
She's a founding member of DOSE. An event-based platform for music artists. Isn't that incredible? So Michelle shared the synopsis, the process and outcomes of the documentary film, which she recently produced and directed the film. Talks about the BKS traffic proposal for Cork City 1968.
[Michelle]
My name is Michelle Delea.
Um, I've kind of been working slash studying architecture since 2011. Still wrapping my head around it. over those years actually included, uh, some work or some valuable areas I spent working with Louise Cutter as well. So it's nice to, uh, share the room with her tonight. Um, and all of you, so I've often kind of took on side projects, uh, to do with engagement and experimental arts and all this.
And so I'm gonna talk to you briefly about, uh, the latest one, which is, as Joe mentioned, um, documentary film. So the document. , it covers the story of the bks traffic proposal for Cork in 1968. Um, and basically bks is a company that is no longer in operation now and what they had proposed, um, so this is the newspaper that was made with the film as well.
I I don't have anything else printed, so I'm gonna use this. So what they proposed, uh, to solve the traffic problem in Cork at the time was a massive ring road a. On concrete still. So it would've been over 20 meters high in some, in some areas. And just to situate ourselves here, it would've been on the west side.
It would've kind of brushed by the courthouse on Washington Street, come down by Elizabeth Port, uh, down Douglas Street, up by the city hall, and actually right above her heads here, above Maureen's bar. So we would've heard, we would've been listening to the corals going by, we're talking giant ridges going over, yeah.
So proper. Uh, motorway highway. Uh, so the, the demolition that was proposed for parking was even more shocking really. So all of these kind of red blocks here, uh, counted for over 90 acres of demolition within the city center. The largest one, and again, very shocking, was, uh, across from nor Main Street to the Col key, right over to half Main Street, all the way to Latz Key, which just would've been flattened to cater for parking.
Passed by the city council. They were in favor for it. They said, let's go, let's solve the problem. Um, and the documentary tells this story from the perspective of the opposers. And crucially, the opposers were brought together by a relatively short-lived architecture course, which was actually in, um, it was situated in the Crawford Act Gallery Place.
Now, this architecture course wasn't supported by the ai they believed. It wasn't necessary for car to have its own architecture course. So it was instead supported by and made official, uh, through Reba, through the UK equivalent. Um, so during the, the course of this, um, of this college, some of the students, they were all male as well as 50, 50, 60 years ago.
Uh, there was a lot of women in the art CLA class at the time of the art college, but not in the architecture. Even though they did, they were shocked to see some women in the Oxford course when they traveled over there. Um, so some of them had gone to Oxford after their studies to do further studies, and they returned to Crawford, our college to, to finish and to teach there as well.
So among those, uh, among those teachers, uh, were, was, uh, Gerald McCarthy. So a very, very passionate, um, intelligent man and he. Kind of rounded off a group of people and created this group called the City 70 Planning Group. So they would kind of informally meet up and talk about what's court gonna look like in the 1970s.
And so, uh, Gerald McCarthy came across this clan. It's a big guest plan, and Shrek and brought it to the City 70 group. So they did everything in their prayer to just make people realize what it actually was. Um, so Des Hein would've done a lot of illustrations. I'll pass this through in later. You can have a look.
Some of them are in. He would've done some illustrations and what it actually would look like from a pedestrian point of view. Um, Gerald himself did, was kind of spokesperson for the group, did a lot of writings, and then crucially, uh, Mary Leland, who's a very prolific journalist and, and still writes, uh, recently wrote on the bus connect scheme, for example, she did a lot of writing with the Irish Times, so she published their drawings and their writings on this, and in the end, actually, also, she, she, she advertised a lot of public meetings that were taking place in the city hall at the time, which were very well attended, which seems like something, it's a shame that, that something like that doesn't happen anymore.
So in the end, a lot of people who were in favor for it kind of strict and the whole thing blew over in the end. . So I'm kind of worried for time, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna kind of wrap it up there. But I think there's a lot of things that I came, came away from this project with. Um, and I suppose just to cherry pick something, um, I think it, I think there's probably a missed opportunity in, um, in just having spaces for communication.
I mean, like this, this is a great example of it, but having space for communication between. disciplines between generations, I mean to speak with a number of architects who had spent, you know, 60, 70 years in the fashion and are now just sitting at home. Like, I'm still really interested, still really dying to speak with, with students and were practicing architects.
Um, they have a lot to, they have a lot to share, especially in hindsight. And I think even, even though we can come across, uh, come up against a lot of unprecedented. Uh, kind of challenges with the city. This, they also function in very cyclical ways, so I think there's a lot to be learned if we could just create the spaces to, to meet and, and discuss that.
Um, so that's all we wanna say for now. Thanks very much for listening.
So the, the name of it is The Sprawling Octopus of an Elevator Highway. And if that is, um, it's the first line in one of Mary Leland's articles about the proposal at the time, so I robbed that offer. Isn't Michelle absolutely incredible to have researched in depth the impact of this traffic proposal and the activism involved to stop this proposal.
[Host]
Now next up is Louise Cutter. Louise Cutter is an architect with a passion for public projects. She's lived in Cork since 2001 and was living in London before that. Louise's Practice Cutter and Neons is working on social regeneration projects and educational buildings in Dublin and Limerick. Louise talks about resilient cities and the battle for space.
[Louise] Okay, well, um, thanks for the introduction and thanks very much for the invitation to this fabulous, fabulous space. I think it's really gorgeous. Um, I'm an architect. I have my own practice, um, in Cork, although most of my work is actually not in cork, so I'm usually schlepping to gal away battling.
Traffic or on the train to Dublin or whatever. Um, but I do love Cork. I'm not from here. I'm, I'm, I have to tell you, no, I'm from Kerry , but I just think Cork is such a mysterious and interesting place and it's always just about to happen , you know? Um, it's been saved seemingly many, every 10 years. It's been saved from horrible overdevelopment.
But yeah, I mean, it's time should come so, , I'm going to speak about, uh, resilient Cities and the Battle for Space. That was the title. So I'll probably talk from some notes because I just jotted this down before I came out. But I guess the built environment is a key tool in, in sort of, you know, helping the planet to survive, you know, sort of saving resources, material, and energy.
But what we forget is that space is also a resource and a very precious resource. It's not that it necessarily has to be. Rationed, but how we use space has to be considered how it's going to develop over time, because time is also a factor in sort of, uh, in, in sort of regeneration and future generations.
So we talk about climate resilience and making sure that. design and planning can make resilience spaces, and that maybe deals with saving energy, uh, dealing with rainfall and looking at side benefits, like maybe designing parks so that we can also store rainwater, uh, planting more trees and all of these things take space and that's where the battle lies.
Um, but a very important factor. In resilience in the future and against climate change and wars and so on, is social cohesion and community. So how do we make these spaces? I mean, I read a really interesting, uh, study by Eric Lindenberg. He's a famous sociologist, and he wrote about the. Disastrous heat waves in Chicago in 1995.
And as expected, of course, the wealthy fared better than the poor. But very interestingly, um, some communities and those that were very resilient and had the benefit of social infrastructure like libraries, small parks and corner shops, amazingly these. Uh, were supported and fared so much better than people who didn't have these resources.
And that really is interesting. And like Michelle says, what, what places need are places where people can support each other and find strangers and other, um, famous urbanist. Richard Senate defines a city is a place where strangers may meet and I suppose it throws a mirror up to cork. Where might strangers.
If they don't have to pay for it or play sports or play GA or whatever, these are the spaces that are missing. I think. Um, that's what I'm gonna say about urban spaces. I guess as a, as a practice, I guess we're very concerned with designing buildings as spaces, and Michelle has worked with us on that. We, we think of space as the thing as a tangible thing that has a shape and a dimension and a character, and not just as objects and concerns me is that a lot of urban development, and particularly now we're seeing it in cork, there are these islands of development that just do not speak to the other islands across the space. And it's all about the how. Who can create the tallest building, who can get the most, you know, blue chip tenants in there and nothing has been made.
Spaces in between. It's not just about landscaping, it's about creating spaces with dimension. And I think what was really interesting is that Covid and the lockdowns really did create a paradigm shift, I think, in how people think about space. I think it might get lost very quickly, but the, the dimensional thing, the two meters, the sense of.
Keep your two meters between people was an eye opener for people. The 5K radius and how we all, you know, rediscovered, forgotten places in the city, was just very special. And how we used spaces, I know everyone talks about, um, princess Street and so on, and we ourselves did work with traders in Caroline Street, but these are.
Very commercial places you have to pay to sit down to avail of those spaces. And nothing really was created sadly, which was kind of free. I mean, I would call out that little space in curls key, the little timber structure. I dunno if any of you went. And again, that was like a little salon. That was really fantastic when the pilot lasted.
Um, , I would say, uh, something which has been really amazing and a precious thing is the, is the marina market. Mm-hmm. . I know it's commercial, but it is because of its generosity of space and the way you have the non-defined places for couches, which has made it so very special. I mean, apart from its offerings, I think what people are really delirious with when they go in there, The absolute space and the fact that we can't have places like that in the city and that they're not encouraged that even dogs come.
So I suppose that's really just the thought I'd like to close on. I, and also, there is a lovely Chinese proverb that has been twisted and you know, changed over many times. But very simply, it states that a man plants a tree and the future, future generation sit under it. And that's just a nice image.
That's it. Thank you. That's me. That question, where is the space to meet strangers? Take a moment to think about that when you get the chance.
[Host]
Now, we'll listen to Bridget Forster. Bridget Forster, or Bridge was a planning barrister in the UK for over 10 years and decided she wasn't making a meaningful impact on the world.
She gave it all up to work in the Middle East with the UN delivering clearance of minds and unexploded ordinance, and now lives in cork. With her husband, bridge shares thoughts on regeneration and tall buildings. So yes, as, as Joe said, um, I was a planning barrister in another life, and so please don't hold that against me.
[Bridget]
Um, I'm new to Cork. I'm still learning what's what, uh, um, so there's just some musings and if I've got the wrong under stick or I've missed something, please don't, please forgive me. Uh, the first time I came to Cork, I swam in the river Lee. I was very drunk.
Um, and I have lived in many cities where the river is the lifeblood or is, is a huge part of the culture and the character of the city. I've lived in London, um, and, and other places. Um, one of the things that struck me and I'm intrigued about is, um, cork is a beautiful city, but it's very flat. There's very little high tool building.
Um, now some people will be happy about that, some people less so. But, um, I guess, uh, I come from the point of view that there's a housing crisis, there's a housing emergency. Whether or not the government agrees with that or will ever say those words, I, I, when, when I first moved here, when we were moving here, my husband from Tunisia and I, one of the things that really made us nervous was, um, the, the, the videos of people queuing for one rental piece of accommodation in Dublin, the, the rental prices, et cetera.
And if, if that makes me nervous and worry. Um, from a place of privilege, I can't imagine how much that impacts on people who are more vulnerable, who are coming here, um, from a place of true vulnerability, um, if you are a migrant or a, or a refugee. Um, so I come from that point of view. There, there is a problem and it, we do need to find a.
Um, I, I am not, however, someone who thinks that you need to throw the baby out with the bath water that we need to, um, because there is a crisis that we need to give up. All of the considerations that we've already heard from, um, from, from, um, people who have studied architecture, but even from people who have a point of view.
Just as a person who lives in a city, works in a city, um, we. We all know what makes us, we're gonna have these questions a bit later, but there are certain ways of design will make people be happier or feel more help with wellbeing. And there are types of design that will not, I was a bit concerned recently.
Um, I saw an article, um, talking about, um, reducing in order to deal with the crisis, um, to reduce, um, environmental impact assessment needs for. for social housing as if that's the problem. The environmental impact assessment is what's causing this. Seriously. This is a bit like blaming refugees for eco eco economic crisis or blaming for the hives and crisis.
It's a bait and switch. And I, I, I worry that if that's sort of, if that's the process, if that's the solution, um, what other cuts, what other cuts in standards are gonna be made for social? so that we end up with very different, I mean, we probably do in any, anyway, I don't know about Ireland, but I mean, in the UK there are, there are problems, uh, that we end up with very different standards for those who have not, who are, who are reliant on social housing and those who can afford to pay non-social housing prices.
Do we then suddenly have safety regulations are, are lower, um, space, the, the, the minimum amount of. Is lower building regulations are different or do we have, where do we have a situation where, um, the amount of outdoor space attributed to social housing is lower? Because we know that space is, is limited.
And so one of the potential solutions obviously is that we build up for things that, um, free up space that then can be used. Things like communal space, et cetera, et cetera. Those, those areas. And, um, I, if I'm, I'll go quickly now to, cuz I've kind of rant, had a little bit of a rant. Um,
I, I was, when I was a baby barrister about 10 years ago, more than 10 years ago now. Um, I was party to, um, all of the quite, um, emotional discussions about, um, the impact of, of high tool buildings on the skyline, historic protected views, um, in London. And, um, I took three things away from those discussions.
First of all, you need to be clear about what, um, views and elements are worth protecting and acknowledge what's already been lost and destroyed. So we are not talking about conservation with a small. Cities have to evolve to accommodate the needs of the people who live and work there. Um, that includes green and open space for people's mental health.
And it's particularly important where housing doesn't have its own integral space. So if we are gonna build up for accommodation, then we do need to have those spaces so that people can go out and see space. Um, cork's not a museum, so we need to focus on identifying and protecting what's. Um, in my opinion, and I know it can be controversial, if you're gonna go big and you're gonna impact on protective or well loved sites views, the design needs to make a statement.
It needs to be striking and iconic. Doesn't mean everyone has to love it. Um, but it has to work, as you've already heard. It has to work with the space and not just be an island. Um, the sh the walkie talkie, the gerkin, you can love them or hate them, but, um, they're not. . Um, and they highlight, I think, rather than detract from the historic London skyline.
And that's been sh i, I personally think that that's been shown as time has gone on. Um, I'm not saying that the Lee is the same as the temps. I know that the scale is obviously different, but there is scope for innovation in building upwards in some locations that wouldn't detract from the river. and would save space for other users.
Use, uh, uses any developments along the river, is going to be fundamental to the vibrancy and economy of cork for the future. And it's gonna impact on the wellbeing of populations who use that space. Um, and of course it's gotta retain and reflect the history and the character of the city. Um, it's gotta be a showcase for visitors, but I think there needs to be some honesty about the areas that have already lost the historic elements and.
Um, where there is capacity and opportunity to deliver something striking. And I will give you an example of Merchant's Key, which is an abomination. And quite frankly, the Opera House, which doesn't do its location or its cultural position justice. I think the people of caucus deserve better
[Host]
Wow. I truly found that powerful. Thank you. Bridge. Thank you to all the other speakers so far. Anyway. . The last, not the least, is Dr. Shirley Gallagher. Dr. Shirley Gallagher is a big picture sustainability thinker, and so she talks about the big picture from cork's point of view. Praise yourself, because she tries to pack it a lot. So enjoy.
[Dr. Gallagher]
So Shirley Gallagher is my name, and yes, I have a PhD. My PhD is in the Belfast, is on the Belfast gas work. I spent 10 years in Belfast before I came down to this lovely city. Um, and I was looking at contaminated land. I was looking at what was contaminating it. So the gas work sites and, and all the kind of British and, and other, you know, of that time of Victorian times, the gas work sites were places that were outside the city and they'd take coal and there was these big, long, narrow.
ovens about the length of this room and there was lots off them. And, and they would cook the coal in an oxygen deficient atmosphere and the coal gas would come off. And then this was piped around the city in quite large, um, pipes, and it would basically light the street lights. If anyone remembers the Little Match Girl, anyone remember that from childhood?
Mm-hmm. . Um, that was the time, you know, the, the, the gas lights were used as a way, and there's a place in Poland in Brasov around the cathedral quarter that they actually still have a gaslight coming around, lighting the lights each, each night, each evening. So I started there in contaminated land and obviously these gas.
A hundred years, 150 years on, they were kind of derelict, contaminated sites and then they were in the middle of the city, so they were repurposed and reused. Um, the Odyssey in Belfast now as part of where the site was and the board gash where board gas is in cork, that was the gas work. In Cork, so they're all over about how you reuse and repurpose.
So I started there and then people may remember back in those days, that was quite some time ago, there wasn't a whole lot of contaminated land in Ireland. You had to kinda look really hard for contaminants. That's no longer the case. So I, I left. Contaminated land. I did a bit of software as well, but because I was creating big data, I was gathering lots of information about what was actually in the, the contaminants.
I'm trying to find out what they were using, different analytical tools, but I went into water. Then I spent about 10 years in water and I was looking at everything from water for injection, from a pharmaceutical point of view, right through to slu. And everything in between, so your river waters and so on and so forth.
And I was telling Nana Anna's here for a couple of days in Cork, and I was telling her in 2000 Cork main drainage was anyone around cork main drainage was happening. And they dug up the city and Oliver Plunkett Street. It took them six times to lay the pipes, cuz every time the pipes were laid, They sank because cork is a marsh.
You are a marsh . And, uh, and, and, and they couldn't, they couldn't get it right and it took a little while. So really what I was kind of thinking for Cork, for Urban Design, when Joe was saying, Asher, give us a talk for three minutes on something, I, I said, yeah, I want to talk about the networks and the, you know, cities are, Yes.
And this concept of a 15 minute city has people come across this idea where pretty much everything you can do is within 15 minutes walking or cycling or, or possibly driving, um, that you can manage to do most of your things. And I try and do that. I live in Glen. and I try and do that with most things.
You know, my hairdresser and my doctor, all the, the kinda the stuff that you, you do. And then my farmer, I, on my way, I go swimming at the weekend and I collect stuff from the farm gate, which is quite nice as well. So transport, Brendan spoke about transport. Anna's gonna speak about transport. I'm gonna skip on transport
Um, but I, I'm also the whole kinda idea of energy, so I, I. I've moved into water and then 2008 there was a conference, the IPCCs, the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change, put out a report in 2008 and they were like, whoa, , there's going to be a disaster in 250 years time. And lo behold, it just shortens and shortens every time they make this eight year report.
And it changed my life. That conference changed my life and I thought, you know, water, I, I was really enthusiastic about the water framework directive and, and getting good. Water status and all the rivers, lakes, and everywhere, and, and then I just thought, no, I need to kind of focus on climate change and being more sustainable and so on how you do it.
So I've, I've dabbled a bit in that energy, dabbled a bit in construction. I'm on the steering committee for Community Energy. I'd love to do something in Cork. But again, how and what we. Is, uh, oh. I've gone over time, Joe. Um, and I, I want to also talk about the saving our lee and the whole, um, the whole, you know, the whole fact that we're a marsh.
There's potential, OPW want to build the, the, the concrete walls. No. Which won't really work. Um, and, and all that type of stuff. But it is having these conversations to create. a place where we all want to live. Um, I'm gonna finish about Covid. I live in Glen Meyer and you know, when we had the two K and the 5k, I kind of ignored it, it a bit cuz you will hear from my accent I'm not from Cork . Um, but what I was really grateful for was I, I had the river, I had the. And it, and I had really, it was quite lovely. I used to go out for a walk. There was no car, so you could go on the road and you know, like it was all quite lovely and it made, lots of people were chatting about biodiversity and that they could hear the birds.
I said the birds were always there, you just couldn't hear them. And uh, so I think I've covered as much as I can in. Oh, I wanted to talk about waste and the whole gathering of it. And that's something I, I'm working in the circular economy at the minute and looking at how we can recover plastic. Cuz what we've been doing in Ireland is we've been gathering it and we've been shipping it out and that's Oh, oh God.
Yes, exactly. and, and you'll, if you come along the keys twice a week, you'll see Green Star shipping. Green waste possibly to Sweden, I'm not quite sure, but you know, like it's all a bit mad. And yeah, we need to kind of create hubs that are, you know, are conducive enough to kind of make it all work and, and have that whole network to.
Um, and, you know, all the, the ai, the io, the, the Internet of Things, all that thing needs to be looked at from a network and a hub's point of view for everything. So thank you all for listening. You're very patient. I've spoken for eight minutes.
[Host]
Well, there you go. So many things to think about while we're on the bus, on the street looking out the window taking a stroll in the park, you know? So I really hope that this episode enriches how you think about. Urban spaces. Keep that conversation going. If you wish to challenge something that was said, please post it across and send it to good decor. If you wanna add anything, definitely go ahead and share. All lines are open to good decor.
I have a bit of news for you. I want you to know that in 2023, the Wild One Salon will be going. And all the details will, of course be across good decor channels. And before I go, of course, I wanna take a moment to thank everyone who's made this podcast possible and who've made the wild ones sell on possible Now.
Huge, huge, warm. Shout out to Harry Menton for creating these podcasts - editing and doing all the magic behind the scenes. Thank you. Thank you, Maureen. Thank you Eilis. Thank you Kel. Thank you, Molly for keeping the energy going for the Wild One Salon. Thank you so much. My sincere gratitude to all the people who have shaped their thoughts and proc them to the salon and shared it with the people of Cork.
Thank you so much. Cannot thank the people who come to the salon who accept invitation and are brave enough to step into the circle and contribute towards changing the narrative. It's incredible. Thank you so much. So have a good winter, a safe winter, and stay hydrated. And of course stay wild. Always.
Thank you for listening.