Old Tallaght Town Centre 1977-1997

The Old Tallaght Town Centre- A History- 1977-1997

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The Tallaght Town Centre was built in 1977 around the site of Bancroft's Castle

Prelude- A Land of Endless Possibilities

In December 1913, approaching Christmas,  a farmer John Poynton was digging the land close to Bancroft’s Castle on his farm at Tallaght Village when his spade struck something rather extraordinary.  It could have been anything, an ancient urn, a Bishop’s crozier, a valuable medieval manuscript. The land at Bancroft’s Castle had once been part of the extensive Archbishop’s Palace estate, dating back to the 13^th Century. Briefly frozen with anticipation, Poynton considered the possibilities.  With a renewed sense of urgency, he turned over the top soil and dug around the solid mass.

On initial inspection Poynton’s find resembled an ancient bronze statue, of an old man with a weather beaten appearance and an abnormally long nose.  With as much curiosity as excitement, he excavated the remarkable hoard.  Scraping away the clotted clay, on closer inspection, it turned out to be a 3.5 Ib potato.

Poynton’s enormous potato was featured in a number of national and provincial newspapers and put on public display.  People travelled from far and wide, from all over Dublin to visit Tallaght village and to see its colossal tuber.

Tallaght Town Centre- 1977

Built around the site of Bancroft’s Castle, the old Tallaght Town Centre, its concept and design, was broadly based on St. John’s Shopping Centre in Liverpool in the UK.  St. John’s had opened in 1969 on a site which had a long established commercial history and market heritage dating back to the 1820s.  Liverpool, a port city and one of the most important docks in the UK had a population of 1.2m in 1970.  Whatever else Liverpool and Tallaght had in common in 1977 was not immediately apparent, then or now.

Shepperton Investments, the developers of the centre were desperate for tenants and traders for the new Tallaght Town Centre in the months before its official opening.  It was supposed to open on the 1st October 1977, but the opening was delayed by over a month as last ditch attempts were made to attract traders.   The panicking developers, trying to hype up demand for any of the 120 vacant units in the new centre went to extraordinary lengths.  A representative of their estate agent, Alan J. Redmond flew to Liverpool to try to entice some of the small traders in Liverpool’s St. Johns Shopping Centre to relocate to Tallaght.  Six shopping units in St. Johns had been badly damaged by fire the previous week and the out-of-pitch traders were being invited to take a look at Tallaght village as an alternative.  

The developer had intended and anticipated a quick sale of units in the £1.2m centre, available for purchase for between £6,000 and £60,000.  With only a month to go before the opening of the centre, less than 50% of the units had been sold. As it became apparent that supply of units was going to greatly exceed demand, tenants and investors were urgently sought.

June 1977

While the Tallaght Town Centre was being built on land that had been jointly held by Dublin Corporation and Dublin County Council, strategic plans dating from the early 1970s were being advanced for a massive development site west of the old village, shifting the commercial and social heart of the village half a mile from the new centre to what would, one day, become The Square.

Concern was raised by Cllr Mervyn Taylor, Chair of the County Council, at what he saw as a developer stealing a march on the County Council in appropriating the name ‘Town Centre’, contrary to well developed and ventilated plans.  “A lot of people are being misled by this description…  We should not allow this to continue.  This developer is purporting to upstage us”, Taylor noted with exasperation.  The Council, seizing the initiative in nothing but name, agreed to erect a large sign on the official ‘town centre’ site so that the people of Tallaght wouldn’t be so brazenly misled.  The Assistant County Manager (and yet to be disgraced), Mr. George Redmond eagerly agreed to write to Shepperton Investments and request they ‘suppress their zeal’, in calling it the Town Centre.  George took a keen, indeed personal, interest in these matters.

The relationships between some developers, planners, elected officials and local authority apparatchiks were often as questionable as they were complex.  There were no doubt, honest and honourable people in all quarters.  But many of them were continually fighting a rear-guard action by unprincipled colleagues and associates- untroubled by the common good, professional obligations or basic ethics.

H Williams, the largest single retail development in Tallaght's history had opened in November 1971, exceeding not only the modest expectations of pedestrian housewives, but also its own planning permission.  H Williams  or “Hachers” as it would come to be known locally, sold groceries, food, clothes and soft furnishings, all within spitting distance of the new shopping centre, built just across the main street.

Announcement of New Centre- May 1977.  It would open almost two months later than planned in December, just in time for Christmas.

Shepperton Investments

The developer of the Tallaght Town Centre, Shepperton Investments led by Seamus Grealy, was neither an experienced developer nor a retail company but simply an investment vehicle established to make a quick return.  The company had little experience of projects on this scale.  The architect for the centre was Dundrum based Michael Larkin.  The centre was initially envisaged to have 120 retail units. As the completion of the centre approached and the anticipated demand for units failed to materialise, this was reduced to 108.  The centre was to operate on a “Small unit, high turnover” model.  It would prove to have a high turnover, particularly, of tenants.

In the same month of Alan J Redmond’s leaving for Liverpool, some residents of Bancroft Park formed a ‘picket’ and were policing the construction of the development after they realised that they were losing some communal green space facing their houses.  The developers of the centre had, like H Williams, exceeded their planning permission- this time by almost 2000 Sq ft.  The following month Dublin County Council was granted a High Court injunction temporarily restraining the developers from carrying out further development on the site.  Such was the state of play, when the Tallaght Town Centre officially opened for Christmas 1977.  Tensions between the local community and the developers would escalate to the point of violence the following summer.

In the second week of July 1978 extensive remedial works were still being carried out on the site by the cavalier developer.  100 local residents, many of them members of Bancroft Residents Association, unhappy with Shepperton breaching their planning permission and encroaching on communal lands, brought shovels and spades and in the spirit of civic engagement, commenced backfilling trenches that had been excavated by the developer for sewage pipes leading to, well, no one was quite sure.  The Chair of the residents association Paddy Mulhearn was assaulted by one of the developers.  A local freelance photographer, Leslie Keating from Bancroft had his camera violently dragged from around his neck by one of the developers who objected to photographs being taken.  The roll of film in Keating's camera was removed and destroyed.  Keating repaired to Elm Park Hospital as a result of neck injuries received during the scuffle.  Extra Gardaí had to be drafted into the area in response to the heightened tensions.

The developers drove a bulldozer over a small shop on the Main Street, “Trendy Fashions”, belonging to Crumlin man, Frank Monaghan.  It was bully boy tactics in the extreme.   The Dominican fathers condemned from the pulpit the bulldozing of Monaghan’s shop as an “act of calculation and power”.  Frank staged an all-night vigil in the ruins of his modest shop to protect what was left of his stock.  It was a double blow for Frank Monaghan.  He had lost much of his stock in a fire in the shop the previous summer.  Bancroft Residents Association met at 8pm in the Dominican Priory that evening to discuss the latest escalation. The meeting went on for some time.  As Patrick Kavanagh once wrote, “’Til Homer’s ghost came whispering to my mind. He said ‘I made the Iliad from such a local row'”.

Evening Herald, July 1978

Tensions were running high outside the centre that first summer of trading and they were no less fraught inside.  On August 19^th 1978, a shoemaker got annoyed when a young girl came into his shop and used a swear word.  The old time cobbler requested that the girl leave his shop and ‘come back in properly’.  The girl instead left the shop and went straight to Tallaght Garda station to complain.  When detective sergeant John McLouglin arrived to investigate the incident, the incredulous 58 year old shoemaker, John Donoghue, got annoyed again when he was accused of having assaulted the girl.  He picked up an iron bar, but didn’t use it.  Donoghue was, as a result, given a one month suspended sentence and fined £50, for assaulting a Garda.  Mr Justice Kennan Johnson said “it was a pity that such a simple incident should be allowed to escalate as it did”.  He said “it was unreasonable to expect the girl to return for her shoes” and criticised Donoghue for his “ill-mannered and bad tempered behaviour”.  The customer, as the old adage goes, was always right.  The incident would lay down a marker for relations between traders and customers in the years ahead.

If the developer had failed at the first hurdle- in keeping within its own planning permission, it also failed on the second- in cultivating goodwill with their most immediate customers.  It would fail again at the third.  Shepperton Investments, failing to attract a large supermarket chain as an anchor tenant to occupy the largest pitch in the centre, then designated the 5300 Sq ft of vacant space a ‘food-hall’.  The possibility of attracting one of the big-four supermarkets to the centre had always been remote.  The loss making H Williams had already set out its stall and was over five years established in the village.  

H William & Co, Tallaght 1975

Dunnes Stores had developed its own Tallaght base, building the new Kilnamanagh Shopping Centre on a 7 acre site, launched on the 10^th November 1977, only weeks before the opening of the new town centre.  Dunnes Stores had 35,000 Sq ft of retail space and parking for 574 cars.  It had sold up to 22 retail units ‘off the plans’ and welcomed established and branded chains such as Best’s Menswear, Peter Mark’s Hairstylists and Manning's Bakery, looking to get a foothold in one of the fastest growing urban areas in Western Europe.

Mr. John Tierney, the manager of the new town centre had previously worked in St. John’s in Liverpool.  Not to be deterred by the challenges and the low uptake of units, he waxed rather optimistically:

“Because business will be transacted in every square foot, the trading pitch will be alive with animated conversation of people engaged in the age-old activity of buying and selling.  If a trader fails to put on a good show, competition will force him to get his finger out and get on with it”.

Tallaght was about to get it’s very own Moroccan style souks.  One year after its official opening, 40 traders were involved in animated conversations, often with each other.

A ramble through the Town Centre

Pamela’s of Tallaght Town Centre

Pamela was a new breed of Tallaght business woman- young, confident and enthusiastic. Pamela had lots of young nieces and nephews and loved children.  So she decided to open a toy shop and to call it “Pamela’s”.  She painted the walls of her shop with characters from Disneyland and Toytown, creating an Aladdin’s treasure cave of toys. Pamela said she took a lower profit margin so that everyone who calls to the shop could afford to buy something.  Much to the delight of adults and kids, children were invited to call into Pamela’s unaccompanied by their parents.

Not all of the initial tenants of the Tallaght Town Centre in 1977 were young and inexperienced entrepreneurs.  But very many were.  Pamela’s idea of branding would in time be emulated by “Celine’s”, “Hannah’s” and “Tracy’s”.

There was a marked contrast between Pamela’s business model and that of her landlord and the developer of the centre.  Once Pamela had signed her lease, Shepperton Investments wasted little time in selling that lease on.  When a unit lease was signed the rent roll from it was sold on by Shepperton Investments Company for 10 years’ purchase of the annual rent.  Shepperton were essentially in the business of ‘flipping’ leases.   Leases for up to 500 years were being offered for sale.

Little Boutiques

There were more boutiques than you could shake an umbrella at, the most exclusive and short lived of which was Tiffany Scales Ladies Boutique, established by a former Miss Ireland.

Tiffany Scales sold Donegal Tweed coats and jackets in trendy Italian styles.  Tiffany had been the Irish representative in the Miss Universe contest back in 1968 in Miami and had gone on, four years later, to marry a mink farmer and furrier in County Wicklow.  On the eve of the Miss Universe Competition, Tiffany informed reporters “If I don’t win here (in Miami), in Ireland I hope to make a shilling here or there”.   “There” as fate would have it turned out to be the Tallaght Town Centre. 

“The people of Tallaght do buy quality fashion goods” she said, rather insistently, at the launch of her shop. “Sometimes, I think the big operators in suburbs provide just a mediocre range of goods but people have become more selective and discerning” she said.  It wasn’t obvious that Tiffany had done her market research.  Tiffany Scales did a modest and marginal trade in ‘Kenetic’ coats, suits and coordinated separates- a range designed in France and manufactured in Ireland in exquisite tweed. Her knitwear collection included classic numbers made of long-haired Icelandic wool and mohair mixes.  It was her first and last venture in Tallaght.  Three months after opening, her husband’s company “Gaymak”, a clothing manufacturer specialising in sheepskin and leather garments, was in receivership. Liquidators would show a prima facia case of fraudulent trading and two years later Mr Justice Barrington in the High Court, ordered that the liquidators report be referred to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Fairytale Children’s Boutique

Margaret and Yvonne Donnelly established “Fairytale”, selling bespoke children’s clothes for 4 to 13 year olds.  Margaret looked after the administration while her daughter Yvonne designed the exclusive clothes.  A graduate of the Grafton Academy of dress designed, Yvonne attached her own creative brand name to the clothes designed in the Tallaght Town Centre- ‘Eve San Martin’.

Tiffany Scales and Fairytale could never compete on price with Miss B - Ladies and Children Boutique, Tamen ladies Boutique and Paul Gerald Ladies Boutique, run by Ann Coburn and Bridget Dunne.  For high-street low-cost prices the ladies of Tallaght gravitated to Hannah’s Ladies Fashions and Stop 32- Ladies and Children’s Boutique.  

The Food Hall

What had been envisaged as a 5300 Sq ft supermarket, in the absence of an anchor tenant, was re-designated ‘a food-hall’.

The Coffee Shop

The coffee shop was initially and, somewhat predictably called The Coffee Shop.  It’s advertising by-line was “For a relaxing cup of Rombouts Coffee or a light snack”.  Most people it would appear had one or the other.  By 1983 it had become The Coffee Inn and was run by the proprietors of the Pine Restaurant in Naas Shopping Centre.

Wright’s Fishmongers

The Wright family set up their first fish and grocery shop in Malahide in 1904 under the name M. Wright and Sons. The company expanded and opened a second shop in Malahide in 1924 and a third in Marino in 1934.  The shop in Marino is the only one of the original shops still open and it changed its name in 1974 to Wright’s of Marino. 

Wright’s Fishmongers, better known as Wrights of Marino, promptly set up shop in the Tallaght Town Centre in 1977, complete with their ‘Seated Mermaid’ logo over their door in the main mall.  They were one of the few experienced and established businesses to take a punt on the unproven pitch.   Wright’s expected to do a brisk trade in costly and perishable goods- smoked salmon, scampi, smoked trout and shellfish;  In Tallaght;  Of a Tuesday.  A disconnect between some of the business owners and the local clientele would be maximised to good effect by entrepreneurial locals who knew the market better.  A lady from St Dominic’s, not far from the Town Centre, set up a one-table fish stall outside Loreto Boy’s National School, every Friday morning and sold cod, kippers, mackerel and ray.  She amassed a price-conscious and loyal following, and was still there long after Wright’s had trimmed their sail.

Mrs. Patsy Walsh from St. Dominic's- Gave Wright's Fishmongers a run for their money

Meat

Bradshaw’s Butchers and Kevin’s Meats keenly competed against the Tallaght Meat Market- a branch of O’Rourke Freezer Meats from Templeogue.  Gerry O’ Rourke of Tallaght Meat Market took a somewhat contrarian approach to selling meat, informing customers “You come to find out what I have, rather than what you want”.  It was a novel approach to shifting meat in Ireland, many years before the Ryanair business model, and not without some foresight. 

Bradshaw’s Butchers took an alternative approach, developing its own unique selling point.  In units 26-28 the staff of Bradshaw’s Butchers were obliged to wear colourful red and blue striped aprons, as distinct from the traditional white butchers apron.  The look was topped-off with straw Boater Hats. Liam Bradshaw’s butchers provided not only victuals to thrifty housewives but also some degree of amusement.

Kevin Ward of Kevins’s Meats, was an old-school butcher and meat merchant with 30 years experience under his belt.  He knew the market well, selling neither frills nor theatrics, but instead a wide selections of choice cuts to new and prudent homeowners in lean times.

Three butcher’s shops were never likely to survive, trading under the one roof.

Fruit & Vegetables

Treynor's ‘Fresh Idea’ was one of the vegetable shops where ‘attractive bargains are to be had from time to time’, as is so often the case with the most perishable of foodstuffs. ‘Fresh Idea’, competed for the attention of the vegetable eating public with Montgomery’s shop “Roots”, not to be confused with the blockbuster TV series and bestselling book of the same period.  A good sized head of cabbage ‘with the dew still on it’, would set you back 10p. There were potatoes that John Poynton would have been proud of.

Just Curtains

‘Just Curtains’ sold, as you might expect an ‘exciting selection’ of curtain fabrics including dupions*, tweeds and prints.  It is difficult now, at a remove of 40 years, to fully appreciate the demand for dupions in Tallaght in 1978. They had an equally exciting range of rails, tapes and draw-chords.  In fact, they had everything you could possibly need to achieve a really professional set of curtains. But you would be mistaken, indeed misled, if you thought that Just Curtains, sold just curtains.  Surprisingly they also stocked a newly fashionable range of roller blinds.  And with an ambition that exceeded their own mission they sold a range of original paintings too, to add that final touch to the home décor. 

*For the uninitiated a 'Dupion' is a rough slubbed silk fabric woven from the threads of double cocoons

Handy Hands

Handy Hands, a dressmaker shop opened by Collette Muldoon sold pattern books, wool, threads and needles, zips and buttons.

Plain and Purl

Plain and Purl did a similar line. Better known as Teresa Farrell and Eamonn Moloney, in addition to stocking needles, yarn and wool, they had a panel of home-knitters supplying machine knitted garments and were available to have garments made to order.  Eamonn himself didn’t actually sew, but he was considering taking it up.

Precision Machines Ltd

Knitting and stitching was almost as popular then as it is now, and no home would be complete without its own sewing machine.  At Precision Machines Ltd, you could buy your very own knitting or sewing machine.  Precision Machines had a shop on Parnell Street in Dublin and brought to the Tallaght town centre a wide selection of machines from Toyota, Bernina, Pfaff, Passap, and the newest of all Frister/ Rosmann.  It was a whole new market, and nobody was quite sure whether the woman of Tallaght would like a good Pfaff or something more reliable. Most wanted nothing more than a traditional Singer but they couldn’t be got with Precision.

Southside Furniture Centre

Gerry McKay’s Southside Furniture Centre summed up their trading policy neatly under the by-line, “We sell furniture cheaply, but our furniture is not cheap”, leaving people like my own father, who was partial to a nice pouffe, scratching his head and walking casually on by, clearly not yet hooked by the catchy and memorable one liner. 

Video King- Established December 1980

For a number of years in early 1980s Video King was one of the more successful stores, promising “more titles than the royal family”.  Established by brothers, David and Alan Kelly, they traded from December 1980 under the banners “Nobody beats the king” and “Europe’s Number 1 Video Club”, neither turning out to be entirely true.  Occupying unit 126 (previously, occupied by Bradshaw’s Butchers) they offered a delivery and mail order service.   Among the 100s of films available was The Long Good Friday, The Elephant Man and Escape from Alcatraz.

But while video killed the radio star, pirates were slowly squeezing Tallaght’s Video king.  After 30 months in business, they were starting to lose market share.  “Pirates have taken away about 35% of our business. Some video clubs have lost as much as 50% of their business to pirates” Alan Kelly explained.  There were three distinct video villains: Bootleggers, Counterfeiters and Pirates.

Bootleggers, were the guys who managed to get their hands on a copy of a film that had not yet been released.  A good proportion of the children in Tallaght had already seen “E.T., the Extra-terrestrial” months before it was released and screened for the first time in the Classic Cinema in Harolds Cross,  adding some weight to Video King's concerns.   Counterfeiters copied legitimate videos and did a very professional job duplicating the printed cover as well, selling the video as an original at a cut price.

But the lowest form of Video Rat was the “Pirate”.  It simply required a guy to have a £2 cable and two machines, or one machine and a friend with a machine and cable and he could duplicate a film “almost indistinguishable” from the original.  Such cables were readily available at numerous stalls in the town centre and it was pirates that were eating into Video King's market.

Across the corridor the brothers had rented a 450 Sq ft showroom selling the most modern video equipment in Ireland.  Both VHS and Betemax system were catered for.  In August 1984 Video King sought to renew a High Court order restraining Shepperton Ltd, their landlord, from entering their rented premises.   At earlier court hearings Video King had claimed it had been intimidated by the defendants (Shepperton) and an existing restraining order was due to expire at the end of that month.

On the 8^th of September 1984 a consignment of video recorders were stolen from the premises of Video King.  A substantial reward was offered. At the time, Gardaí were investigating a series of break-ins and thefts in the centre.

By the end of the year Video King had abdicated their position in Tallaght Town Centre, and had moved to Nutgrove Shopping Centre, before opening a second branch opposite Phibsboro Shopping Centre on Dublin’s Northside. 

The Sports Gallery

Established in 1984 by Kevin McGrath in unit one, The Sports Gallery sold logoed t-shirts, tracksuits, football boots, trainers, darts-sets and of course, much-much-more. By 1989 it had moved to Unit 6. As local Ticket Agent for the FAI, The Sports Gallery was the in-place to go for supporters of Jackie’s Army in Tallaght, making Mr. McGrath, while not rich, extremely popular! The 1986 World Cup qualifiers and the Euro ’88 competition set ablaze the demand for all things football, making crested sports and leisure wear de rigueur in Tallaght.  With the opening of The Square in 1990, The Sports Gallery traded through that difficult Christmas but by the time Ireland failed to qualify for the 1992 Euros, The Sports Gallery had hung up its boots in the town centre.

Confectionery Kiosk

Probably the smallest unit in the centre was ‘The Kiosk’, just inside the main door on the ground floor. Best remembered by a generation of kids as the place they got their first Slush-Puppy, when the Kiosk was put up for sale in July 1987, it had a turnover of between £130,000 and £150,000. It was a good time to sell.

No. 13 (News Extra)

Number 13 was opened by Paul Muldowney in 1977 selling newspapers, periodicals, stationary, confectionery and basic food stuffs.  They stocked a range of foreign language publications, which one can only assume must have been on the top shelf.  By May 1980 the newsagents had a turnover of over £400,000 per annum or £40 per Sq ft-, one of the highest turnovers in the country for that type of business.  Being external to the centre itself, it opened at 7am, a full hour before most other traders had arrived for the day.  Buses travelling to and from the city centre stopped a 100 meters from the street-facing shop.  It benefited from the footfall of customers accessing or passing the centre.  After it changed hands in 1980, it became ‘News Extra’, but the earlier name “No. 13”, had by then already become ingrained in the local psyche and was still referred to as No. 13 in the 1990s.  

More than I care to remember

Tony Weldon launched Cut N’ Shape- Unisex hair stylists in competition to Derek Raymond Hair Stylist.  Dozens of shops and stalls opened and traded, all with varying degrees of success. One by one they inevitably closed-  Oyster Delicatessen, The Men’s Shop (closed in July 1988.) The Carpet Store (opened June 1987). Doorways ( selling plate glass and door-locks);  Drive-Way (selling car seat covers & motoring accessories);  Nice Things ( jewellery and watches); Costello Doors; Patrick O’ Toole's, Reliance Alarms, Pet Shops, Flower shops etc. etc.

 It would be hard to think of a business that was not tried at some point. 

July 1988

Arial View- Tallaght Town Centre (Photo, Brian Mac Cormaic)

Tallaght Jewellers- 1978-1991

One of the earliest traders to see the 1990s in the Town Centre was Tallaght Jewellers Ltd, established on the ground floor by Mrs Mai Stephenson.  Specialising in watch and jewellery repairs and the sale of jewellery, trophies, silver plate and cut crystal, they also provided a painless ear-piercing service. They would sell their last Christmas gifts in the centre in 1990, before moving over to a new unit in the recently developed Village Green in 1991.

M and L Shoes – 1978- 1991

Few of the earliest shops would see their tenth anniversary in the centre.  One of the exceptions was M & L Shoes.  Established by Gerry McCormack and Sean O’ Looney in 1978, M & L did a steady trade throughout the 1980s.  They saw off a number of competitors over the years.  With the general deterioration of the centre and the opening of the Square in 1990 the writing was on the wall (sometimes quite literally!) for their Tallaght shop.  In 1990 they established a branch in Clondalkin and with the closure of the Tallaght shop in 1991, after almost fourteen years trading, they opened another in the Town Centre Mall in Swords.

April 1988, M & L shoes celebrated 10 years trading in the town centre

10^th Anniversary in Candle Light

In the weeks before the 10^th Anniversary of the centre, in October 1987 the traders were quite literally left in the dark.  The history of the management of the centre had been a chequered one. Following prolonged estate & facilities management failures by Shepperton, the traders association had taken over the effective day-to-day management of the centre.  A representative of the 72 traders became a keyholder for the centre.  On the 15^th of October 1987 the ESB was cut off from the centre as a result of Shepperton Investments failing to pay the account.  For a number of years previous, Shepperton had essentially been an absentee landlord.   The High Court, while sympathetic to the plight of the traders, ordered the traders representative to hand over the keys to Shepperton.  However, the traders were unwilling to relinquish the keys, in the absence of commitments from Shepperton that they would assume their rightful responsibilities to have electricity, cleaning and security services reinstated, all of which had ceased.  Shepperton, playing hardball, sought a committal order to have the trader’s representative sent to prison, for failure to comply with the previous Court Order. Ultimately the High Court refused to grant a committal order, again ordered him to return the keys to Shepperton, and ordered Shepperton to have electricity promptly reinstated. The traders converged on the offices of Bank of Ireland Finance and urged officials there to appoint a liquidator to the centre.  For the 72 traders operating there, the 10^th Anniversary celebrations of the troubled centre were decidedly muted. 

Into the West

In 1990 Dublin County Councillors called for the closure of the centre unless the premises were promptly brought up to fire and safety standards.   Dublin Corporation had served a fire notice on the owners of the complex the previous year, 1989.  In the event of a fire, “Neither workers nor customers would be able to escape from the second floor” they noted.  Front and centre of the minds of Dublin Corporation and no doubt, the elected representatives of Dublin County Council – was the imminent opening of the all new “Town Centre- The Square” in 1990.   A town couldn’t possibly have two centres. One had to be extinguished.

If the opening of The Square in 1990 shifted the commercial centre of the greater Tallaght area, the opening of the Village Green in 1991 shifted the centre of gravity of the old village.  The Village Market- Fruit and Veg Shop, Jimmy’s Butchers, 747 Travel, Tallaght Jewellers, Celine’s Flower Studio and Spar all offered what had for 13 years attracted people to the Tallaght Town Centre.

The relocation of the Post Office in the village from SuperValu (previously H Williams,) to the Square Complex and in time the closure of Supervalu itself, all contributed to the drift west, as did the opening of the £15m Tallaght RTC in September 1992. 

In the early 1990s drinking parties, vandalism and anti-social behaviour in the centre were causing increasing concern for the nearby Bancroft Residents Association.   In May 1992 nine youths were arrested following a mass brawl in the centre after a running battle between rival gangs that lasted for several hours.  Gardaí were called to quell the violence on two separate occasions.

At Christmas 1992, a troop of cub-scouts from Granard, Co. Longford were having their annual Christmas adventure, a day trip out to Dublin with their troop-leaders to see ‘The Wizard of Oz’ in the Olympia Theatre.  Word had reached Granard in recent years, that a trip to Dublin really wouldn’t be complete without a detour out to Tallaght for the shopping in the town centre.  Not familiar with the locality they approached Tallaght from the M50 and found their way to Balrothery, were they asked for directions to the town centre. They were promptly and honestly advised by an elderly pedestrian to ‘keep going straight ahead ‘til you get to the village and it’s on the right hand side. You can't miss it.  You’ll see the sign for News Extra’.  After 10 minutes walking around the old town centre, the pack leaders quickly came to the conclusion, that much of what they had heard and read about Tallaght over the previous 20 years, had been no exaggeration. “Now children” a pack leader was overheard asking the boys “Would you still like to live in Dublin, or would you prefer to live in Granard?”

By 1994 only three traders remained in the old centre-  the Newsagents, a Chinese takeaway and the record store. It was officially considered a derelict site by South Dublin County Council.  The Council had taken Shepperton to court twice, where they had been fined under the Derelict Sites Act. “We cannot close it as there are sitting tenants who are claiming tenancy rights”, said their company solicitor.  The centre was a little over 16 years old. 500 year leases had been offered 16 years earlier. 

It would not be long before even News Extra, one of the most successful and prominently placed units, rolled down their shutters for the last time.

In 1995 Cllr. John Hannon, the Chair of South Dublin County Council described the centre as “A dangerous eyesore and a blot on the landscape”, when the Council sought to exercise its power to put a compulsory purchase order on the site at an estimated cost to the local authority of £100,000.  A number of leasees claimed an interest in the centre. The Council would not be out of pocket.  They would go on to sell off a portion of the site, for private residential development.

Turnover in the centre had arguably been greatest among the actual tenants and traders. Over the decade from 1978-1988, several hundred small business came and went.  Location, footfall, competition and security all contributed to the rise and ultimate decline of the ill-fated complex.  It had always been destined to falter and destined to fail:  Exceeding planning permission on a site contrary to the strategic plans for the area; failure to secure a magnet or anchor tenant; competing against a neighbouring supermarket which itself had exceeded its planning permission; developing and opening parallel to the development of Kilnamanagh Shopping Centre; an over-reliance on small, unbranded, inexperienced and first time traders; laissez-faire management of the complex; not paying the ESB Bill!  The wonder is not that it closed, but that it remained open at all for so long.  Once an alternative was offered, it was embraced.

1997

South Dublin County Council would make almost £4.5 million by forcing owners, mostly small traders, to sell their units to them under compulsory purchase orders (CPOs).  Most small traders were offered ‘four figure sums’ arrived at under an arbitration process.  Barbato Borza, who had acquired Unit 1 for £36,000 in the mid-1980s was offered a meagre £6, 345. It had been independently valued at £99,000.  The centre was acquired in full by SDCC, to enable the construction of a new link-road.  However, much of the land on either side of the new road was not affected, and was later sold by South Dublin County Council to Dublin developer John O’Connor for £4.5 million.  The developer was granted planning permission by South Dublin County Council to build four residential apartment blocks.  Borza’s site, Unit 1, was within the boundary of one of those apartment blocks.  South Dublin County Council would not comment on individual cases. 

***

For all of its shortcomings and for all of its failings, between 1977 and 1990 the Tallaght Town Centre became an important focal point in the community of Tallaght.  For many of the small traders it became a community in itself.  For some of Tallaght’s young population it provided the first point of entry to a depressed labour market- giving valuable experience, and in turn, opportunities to young school leavers, to get just enough experience to enable them to get jobs elsewhere.  For many it was in the UK, and for some, perhaps Liverpool.  For Tallaght’s young entrepreneurs it provided a school-of-hard-knocks in which they could test their business acumen, hone their skills or temper their ambition.

There are many “40-somethings” still in Tallaght, or now in the far flung corners of Dublin’s commuter belt- in Meath, Wicklow and Kildare who not only remember the name of their first 7” single or 12” Album- but can recall the dark little record store in which they parted with their £3 or £4 – ‘Radio Shack’ owned by Gillian Byrne.   My £3 was spent there on “Complete Madness” in 1982.  It has stood the test of time.  I have spent a great deal more on similar since.

Under the roof of the Tallaght Town Centre, purses were lost and wallets were found. Handbags were stolen, or perhaps just mislaid;  romances blossomed and marriages faltered; debs dresses, baby clothes and engagement rings were returned unworn;  rosettes and medals were bought by grandmothers, for the big family days in April and May;  mothers bought trainers for their first mini-marathon;  students bought newspapers to find flats in Rathmines, or teenagers looking for cinema times;  and schoolboys kicked about in their George Webbs or Docs while their fathers haggled over the price of their jocks.

All that is left of the Tallaght Town Centre,
 found in a scrapyard in Finglas in 2020

 

The old Tallaght Town Centre is remembered by many and missed by few.

Albert Perris