Dalkey... Where the streets have no shame
FORGET U2 at The Sphere in Las Vegas. The best live entertainment coming out of Dalkey all year happened at the Living Streets Initiative. There was, by all accounts, ‘standing room only’ at the packed meeting, which was ostensibly about traffic management.
One particularly under-siege welldressed man in his 50s, complaining about traffic restrictions introduced in the area in recent years, likened the struggles of locals in Dalkey to the plight of Palestinians in Gaza. According to a number of sources, including local resident and Twitter user Sarah Hynes (who first broke the story) this unnamed man said: ‘Those of us who live in Dalkey are like residents of Gaza as a result of the Living Streets Plan as we can’t drive our cars.’
Given the angry man’s utterance it is notable that the meeting was held at The Eblana Club in Dalkey. Of course it was at a club. Heaven forbid the well-heeled Dalkonians congregate in a common or garden community centre. But then again. Dalkey doesn’t have community centres; that’s why the leafy suburb can’t host refugees. Dispatches from the ground in the besieged town of Dalkey meeting reported that ‘most people present immediately registered their disapproval at the remark’.
Ms Hynes was in strong disagreement with the man. She responded to him by saying: ‘No, Dalkey residents are not like Gaza. They are nothing like Gaza residents. No they are not.’
Apparently that obvious fact needed reiterating.
Another local at the meeting, Darragh Cassidy, said the man’s view was ‘the most ridiculous comment of the evening’. Which begs the question, if this was only the most ridiculous of the evening, what’s the most ridiculous one of the year on the mean streets of Dalkey?
Fine Gael councillor Lorraine Hall said everyone else present at the meeting made it clear nobody agreed with his view.
‘This comment was completely inappropriate and totally out of order. The room booed at him,’ she said.
The only thing missing from this tableau seems to have been an elderly woman on hand offering free tea refills, and a couple of rowdy priests shouting out ‘Down with that sort of thing’.
Even if Dalkey man was roundly condemned, his comment does demonstrate a uniquely selfabsorbed view of the world, which is native to South Dublin. The only way to top proceedings at the Eblana, would be a humanitarian concert put on by local resident Paul ‘Bonovox’ Hewson for the relief of the ‘those of us who live in Dalkey’.
He could repurpose a song or two?: Where the Streets are a Pain; I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For... (a parking space); All That You Can’t Leave Behind (your car); (Dun Laoghaire/Rathdown council moves in) Mysterious Ways; Stuck in a Village That You Can’t Get Out Of; Dalkey Bloody Dalkey; All I Want Is... a right to drive my car; Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Clamp Me.
I could go on. But I’ll spare you, like our Dalkey man should have.