Phoenix: Direction of travel

Support sometimes comes from the most unusual quarters. 

When state sponsored inequity is highlighted here it’s not unusual to have political voices recite the party line: “nothing to see here, everything is in hand, complaints are unjustified, elect us and everything is/ was/ will be fine” etc. 

But what do you say when David Kelly, Director of the Southern Regional Assembly, pipes up? 

He reaffirmed the Assembly's “strong support for the Project Ireland 2040 process, as it presents us with a unique opportunity to address critical issues facing Ireland over the next 20 years. Major structural and geographic investment imbalances still exist.” 

The National Planning Framework to 2040 proposes spending approximately €7,000 per head in Waterford and €19,000 per head in Dublin, the land of €350,000 bike sheds and €1.4 million security huts. 

The difference is sinful. 

Don’t mention the €2,400 million (and counting) National Children’s Hospital. 

Just ask yourself again, how in this land of such obvious plenty, where a wonderful €9 million in sports grants was handed out last week across county Waterford alone, can much needed investment in acute medicine, airport, third-level education and Foreign Direct investment jobs in our city not be found?

A “major” Waterford project would be something from €10 million upwards. The North Quays qualifies and the new surgical hub at UHW is well over that limit. 

Increasingly, major projects in Dublin are denominated in billions of Euro, as if that city has to receive huge public “dole” payments to keep the big party going and support massive property valuations. 

I know it’s our capital city and we should be proud of it, but the desire to spread Dublin along the entire east coast is not sensible. 

It may yet be that Belfast and Waterford will anchor the northern and southern limits of Dublin in the not too distant future, but meanwhile, it’s Dublin and the Pale versus the Cork/Limerick/Galway axis. 

Waterford is left out of the latter and squeezed by the former. 

The western axis is doing alright, thank you. 

A recent jaw-dropping IDA announcement of two fantastic investments from Eli Lilly of a $1 billion expansion of their Limerick site and a new $800 million expansion in Kinsale, could only leave you wondering how our small city is expected to keep pace?

Waterford has never seen anything on that scale. Indeed, it is public gossip that a major medical devices firm came calling here two years ago and were directed elsewhere in the south east because the IDA did not have a site to cater for them. That has not been refuted by the IDA, even as the Cartamundi plant (closed with the loss of 234 jobs) stands idle on the Cork Road. 

Meanwhile, Fine Gael is “working with Minister for Enterprise Trade & Employment Peter Burke to create the right conditions for further growth and investment in Waterford”. 

Really, like building the SETU engineering building? 

An announcement some time ago of tech jobs in IBM/ Red Hat was made, but little news or development thereafter. 

Huge physical investment like Eli Lilly, Bausch and Lomb or Sanofi anchors a company in a place. 

Jobs may be coming, but Waterford has not seen enough new IDA business. 

Some suggest that this is our own fault in terms of making the city attractive to outside investors, but economists say that private money follows the certainty of public investment. 

In a microcosm, Frisby Construction is developing the old glass offices because SETU bought a large portion of the site. Perceived lack of investment in UHW and SETU Waterford undermines business confidence.

For its part in Waterford’s development, our council has ambitions for a major new tourism proposition, a 'project of scale', to replace the ambitious 'Guardian of the Déise', which was mooted some years ago. 

Presumably this will require the now mandatory recruitment of consultants to tell us what we should have. 

Fair enough. My 50 cents worth is that the city itself is the “project of scale". It has long been mooted that the city was somewhat unloved by council management since the 2014 amalgamation as the North Quays was the main focus. 

More needs to be done. The Viking Triangle has stabilized that part of the old city, but the condition of the old PO sorting office site and council archives in High Street, the 20-year-old surface car park in Exchange Street and the awful Jenkin’s Lane, undermine much good work. 

Private property owners have hoarded sites without any visible maintenance. The Sinnott’s Pub site and surrounds on the corner of Manor Street and John Street disgrace Waterford and the people who own them. 

The council tried to CPO the Royal Bar site in Lombard Street (derelict for a decade) but were thwarted by An Bord Pleanála as the owners applied for permission to demolish the Royal Bar building and redevelop the site. 

The ruins of the Power’s Seeds warehouse on the Dunmore Road, 100 metres from UHW, capture in a nutshell the belief in the overriding rights of private property in Ireland. Let it rot baby! 

We must be better than that.

In this Ireland of million dollar bike sheds and security huts, we are rightly concerned about the level of OPW input in Waterford, our GPO on the quay being a case in point. The roof is decorated with scaffolding with no work being done, while the amount of weed growth in the overhanging building cornice is disgraceful. 

The small tree growing from the chimneys carries a public message of disinterest from Dublin for all to see. 

Our council must find emergency funding for Mount Congreve where the gardens and buildings need constant attention, while government OPW operatives in Kilkenny Castle, Tintern Abbey and elsewhere are on their knees clipping, manicuring and maintaining grass verges with a shears. Such nice attention to detail can only be dreamt of in Waterford.

It is worthwhile reminding everyone that the present government and its Fine Gael-led predecessors have not invested a single cent in new teaching facility or building at WIT/ SETU in Waterford since 2011. 

Apparently WIT/SETU is the only Irish third level institution to be so disadvantaged. 

What impact has that had on the city’s development and on private developer’s confidence in investing here?