Anyone with even a cursory knowledge of the architectural legacy of this State will be bemused by last week’s statement from Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers that the Government will prioritise “cost and efficiency over design standards and aesthetics” in future spending on infrastructure.
The idea that Ireland’s modern built environment is characterised by excessively high levels of design or an undue deference to aesthetics is a surprising one, and not borne out by the evidence.
It is possible the Minister’s remarks were prompted by widespread criticism of the project to build a national children’s hospital, which has run wildly over budget and over schedule. Some observers have criticised the design of the building as a contributory factor in these overruns, although it is not entirely clear whether that is correct. Certainly, the new hospital has elicited both admiration for its child-centric vision and negative commentary for its scale and cost.
But Ireland already has no shortage of low-quality contemporary architecture. The cities in general and Dublin in particular are littered with too many examples of banal buildings.
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And it was only from the 1990s onwards that large-scale infrastructure – sports arenas, bridges and tunnels, a national motorway network – began to have a real impact on the landscape. The financial crash of 2008 put a sudden halt to any hope of continuing that progress.
One casualty of the crash was the Metro connection to Dublin airport, which in various guises has been in gestation for nearly 25 years. That particular project might also have been on the Minister’s mind when he made his comments. While Ireland dithered over building high-volume public transport infrastructure, other European countries forged ahead rapidly and cost-efficiently. One frequently cited example is Madrid’s extensive, no-frills metro network, delivered in just a few years at a fraction of the cost per kilometre now estimated for Dublin’s line.
Ireland should certainly learn from such examples, while tendencies towards grandiosity at the planning stage will have to be kept in check if the State is to have any prospect of narrowing the infrastructure gap that currently exists between Ireland and other wealthy European countries.
But to conflate cost control with the abandonment of good design is to miss the point entirely. When the new children’s hospital finally opens its doors, it will not be the budget rows or delays that endure, but the experience of the space itself. Design is not an ornamental afterthought; it shapes how we use, feel, and function within our public spaces. A well-designed building earns its keep over decades in health, dignity and civic pride. If the State is serious about building for the future, it must recognise that fact.
