Temple Bar, Dublin culture district article

Temple Bar promotional mural  Photo by Thomas Mulchi, on Flickr.

is online here, "Dublin’s Temple Bar District as a leading example of culture district revitalization initiatives" at the Europe in Baltimore website for the European Union National Instiuttes of Culture's Washington Cluster project there.

From the standpoint of urban planning, the planning framework and approach that was created to implement a renewal program in Temple Bar is quite remarkable. They specifically rejected a real estate development approach focused on large projects, maximization of property values, and the eventual displacement of artists and others.

Instead the program was to be led by improvements in the cultural offer and the creative industries– arts as production.

The plan called for improvements in the quality of the public realm, development of empty sites, improving the condition of often dilapidated buildings, strengthening existing businesses–about 70% of the businesses located in Temple Bar in 1991 moved there after 1983–and attracting new ones, and attracting and developing culture venues, without losing the architectural identity or cultural vitality of the district.

Interestingly, the district raises two issues that I didn't know about before I started the piece:

1.  Opposition by some Dublin artists to the idea of "creative industries," and monetization of the artistic impulse;

2.  Financial improprieties by the Temple Bar Cultural Trust and inadequate oversight of the corporation by the city government is leading to the dissolution of the TBCT and its de-merger into city government.

The creative industries concept is addressed in the next piece I am way behind on, about Helsinki.

And even though the pieces aren't supposed to have "gotcha" elements, I did discuss some of the implications of the TBCT issue.