Our New Year Resolutions.

Edinburgh Castle & our Hogmanay party.

In Scotland we do not celebrate the coming of the New Year we celebrate the passing of the Old Year. Our Hogmanay, which is also celebrated on the 31^st December, is quite probably a Norse and Gaelic fusion that originally celebrated the winter solstice.

Our modern version allows for a rather delightful custom of “first-footing” where, just after midnight, we would visit our neighbours, bringing them a lump of coal for their fire, whisky to warm them up and, depending on where you live, some food in the form of a type of rich fruit cake (or black bun) or even the gift of the odd pickled herring!

Auld Lang Syne lip syncing begins.

It is at this time of year, when the bells are struck at mid-night that we all stand on wobbly, booze soaked legs, we link our arms together in one big circle and sing one of Scotland’s most famous poems “Auld Lang Syne”, penned by none other than Robert Burns. This is one of those songs that we all know the chorus to but as for the other words and verses they are lost in a hail strum of slurred humming and pretend voice syncing that would do our modern day pop stars proud.

Like that other tradition, we Scots do however make the odd New Year resolution, mostly around having a healthier life style for the year ahead. We do go out of our way to make such commitments but the lure of one of our culinary contributions to world food, the deep fried mars bar, comes a calling after the Hogmanay hangover and usually within 24 hours the healthier resolution has been kicked into touch.

So what should we look for when we are considering Waterford’s New Year resolutions?

Culinary heart attack in a box!

I do hope that those with both power and influence for Waterford will have tangible 2016 New Year resolutions that will essentially deliver. For so many years we have missed out on investment whilst other neighbouring counties have benefited from so many New Year promises.

As the Government is currently awash with lots of extra tax revenue, and influencers are stuffing their own constituency ballot boxes with this extra cash, I would ask for €15 million to invest in UHW’s cardiology unit. This will allow the speedy completion of the unit and sufficient funding to run the service for the next 3, 4 or 5 years.

Another €20 million to finally deliver and create a University for Waterford and the South East with all the bells and whistles needed to attract significant research funding. Not a fudged pressure delivered hotchpotch multi-campus minestrone soup of an organisation, as is being proposed, but a REAL University based and administered in Waterford City that will clearly benefit the economic future of the entire South East.

A further €25 million to develop our North Quay, the railway station and the port to drive a whole new tourism market for Waterford and the South East. If we could develop these three vital pieces of the City’s infrastructure we could place Waterford City at the very heart of the Ireland’s Ancient East tourism project and make Waterford City the 3 or 4 night destination stop that would be the anchor for every tourist wishing to explore this Ancient East region.

Happy Hogmanay!

Only circa €60 million, and not a long term loan, would go a long way to redressing the lack of focused investment in Waterford and the South East. We are at the moment seeing our hospital, our docks/port and our third level education establishment being ever so slowly dismantled and systematically taken away from us. If we are not careful these essential pieces of infrastructure will soon disappear for good.

If we do not have strong political and public representation fighting for every Euro of the Government investment pie we will remain the City that always had concrete New Year resolutions that were never actually delivered.

We do not want to be eating deep fried Mars Bars early next year.

Happy Hogmanay!

Our chance to make a land grab!

"We can use these & fill them with the North Quay rubble."

My recent article, published in the Waterford Today, on the North Quay’s demolition has certainly sparked much debate around the lack of removal of the rubble and a number of people have been in touch stating that they were led to believe that the whole site would be left “clean and clear” once the demolition had taken place.

The potential for huge piles of rubble, which we could all be staring at for months on end, got me thinking about a creative way WE could help to shift said rubble as a cost neutral exercise for Council. That is assuming that the rubble will not be left in architecturally pleasing piles that we are told resemble the pyramids of Giza.

It is only a matter of time before we get the call to arms, which will be broadcast loud and clear on Deise AM, for the people of Waterford to get involved in helping shift the rubble as no extra money could be found in the Council’s 2016 budget to do this on our behalf.

I can just imagine thousands of people from Waterford marching across Rice Bridge and visiting the North Quays wearing overly baggy trousers and, rather strangely, being observed placing large quantities of the rubble into their trouser pockets. In a similar manner to Messer McQueen, Gardner, Pleasance and Attenborough in The Great Escape and of course Robbins in The Shawshank Redemption.

How long will it take to build a new wall?

Having secretly filled hidden jute sacks inside their baggy trouser legs the people of Waterford would head off in the direction of Ferrybank and the Port where they would deposit the rubble along Minister Coffey’s proposed new boundary line.

Over a period of months the North Quay would be rid of the rubble and a new city wall would have appeared, grabbing the very land that Kilkenny Councillors are incredulously protecting. An area that, until now, Kilkenny Council seem to have had no interest in until they heard the sound of commercial rates income coming from the expansion of the IDA site at the Port of Waterford.

Literally over night Waterford City would have expanded and we would suddenly, for once and for all, have incorporated Ferrybank and the Port of Waterford under the control of Waterford Council. There would be no need for any more committee discussions as the people of Waterford would have taken the bulls by the horns, bypassed all the political rhetoric and done what should have be done years ago.

The added bonus would be that our history of unconquerable walls is good, “Urbs Intacta Manet”, and once we secured the land grab it would be impossible for Kilkenny to take it back.

With such large quantities of stone and rubble needing to be moved we could also restart the old jute factory and for a short window of opportunity someone could create a wee cottage industry to supply the small jute sacks ideally sized to perfectly fit inside a trouser leg. Eventually the old jute factory could be turned into a real working museum along the lines of Verdant Mills in Dundee.

A hot topic on both sides of the River Suir.

The above is of course fantasy and the ramblings of an over active mind but the sentiment and meaning are real.

If Waterford City and County are to compete with our neighbouring counties and towns then we really need to look to the future with added aggression and ambition.

The North Quay must not become an eyesore for our citizens and the City’s 2016 visitors. It was hard enough to keep positive when the works on the South Quay were taking place and trying to constantly explain that “2011 Tall Ships are coming back” banner was beyond a joke!

Optics is everything. Incorporating Ferrybank and the Port into the City will make us a better place to invest in and, more significantly, we will be able to control our shop window to the City, which at the moment is controlled by Kilkenny Council. 

Now where is the sense in that!