A SPATIAL VISION FOR DUBLIN
Dublin is in many ways unrecognisable from what it was even twenty years ago. From a city with few visitors, high unemployment, dereliction and virtually no one living in the City Centre, it has changed into an accessible city, popular with tourists and young people, high employment with a thriving economy and culture and a place in the top ten of European cities. Nonetheless, the city faces many problems and has been quoted as an international example for urban sprawl. The vision of DCBA suggests strategic policy in eight areas in order to retain and build on the success that has been achieved in recent times.
The vision presents the views and aspirations of the business community of Dublin City. The city has many strengths including the Georgian core, the low rise buildings in the City Centre and the fact that the city can be walked quite easily. The city is also a popular tourist destination. However, a number of factors such as weak transport infrastructure, sprawling nature of the city and, to some extent its limited size in global terms, detract from these strengths.
In order to benchmark Dublin against other (European) cities, ranking publications have been chosen based on three criteria against which a successful city can be measured:
- Quality of Living
- Size of the Metropolitan Area
- Best Cities to Locate a Business Today
Although it is clear from analysis that successful cities do not have to be large cities, or even capital cities, it is clear that cities such as Amsterdam and Düsseldorf benefit from forming part of urban networks which create large metropolitan areas. Based on our review of ranking of cities, the following cities are chosen as suitable cities to examine as possible examples for Dublin. These cities can be divided in three geographical regions:
- Northern Europe: Amsterdam, Düsseldorf, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Helsinki.
- Central Europe: Munich, Vienna, Zurich.
- Southern Europe: Barcelona, Madrid, Milan, Lisbon.