Little History of the Future of Dublin

Exploring Dublin City’s past, present and future

Charting the development of our capital city from its Viking origins through 1660splanning and the rise of Georgian Grandeur and contemporary urban planning, to finally examine the failures, successes and potential of Dublin today.
Ireland’s most respected commentator on the urban landscape, Frank McDonald, explores visions of the city, from the work of the Duke of Ormonde to Abercrombie’s Dublin of the Future, through the excesses of the Celtic Tiger, to the decisions taken in the aftermath of the property crash.

A Little History of the Future of Dublin will inform public debate about the future of the capital in thecontext of competing visions of the ‘good life’. In light of wider events such as Brexit and the Covid-19pandemic, this superb analysis could not be more timely and the book finishes with a plan for how thecity could once again become one of the great small capitals of Europe.

Every generation has come up with its own vision of the future. In this bracing and provocative new work, McDonald presents the past, present and future of Dublin as imagined by various planners over its history (as well as the various ideas of the ‘future’ of the city they suggested). Alongside the main essay, prominent opinion forming Dubliners (including Fintan O’Toole, Una Mullaly, Alice Leahy, andJoe Duffy) reflect on the future of Dublin, and explore how we can get there.