Scrolling through commercial property listings, one is truly exceptional. Baggot Street Hospital is for sale – a huge and stunning building in Dublin city.
It was designed by Albert Murray, a man from a family of architects including William Murray (his grandfather), cousin of the architect Francis Johnson.
An article published by Edmondson Architects, reveals that William Murray designed the College of Surgeons on St Stephen’s Green. His son, William George Murray, designed the Royal Marine Hotel in Bray and the Royal College of Physicians on Kildare Street.
Albert Murray designed the Dublin Central Mission on Chancery Place, but his hallmark building was what became the Royal City of Dublin Hospital, otherwise known as the Baggot Street Hospital.
The younger Murray’s style was colourful and decorative. Another example of his architecture is on Dawson Street, the Drummond’s Seed warehouse building.
Part of the complex is earmarked for a primary care centre. The rest is now being sold. That this building was surplus to the Health Service Executive’s (HSE) needs and was being prepared for sale was widely signposted. And what a building to have the chance to buy. No doubt there are various international hoteliers rubbing their hands with glee. But Dublin city needs public housing and amenities far more urgently than it needs another hotel.
Given that it would be a good building and site to keep, one wonders why it’s going. State bodies are obliged to notify the Land Development Agency (LDA) of sales of public land through a Section 53 Notice.
According to reporting by Christina Finn in The Journal, the HSE only officially told the LDA on October 15th, after it went on sale.
[ I want MetroLink, but must it be at the expense of St Stephen’s Green?Opens in new window ]
The following day, the head of the HSE, Bernard Gloster, told the Public Accounts Committee, that if another State agency wanted it, “I will have to be informed of that because I cannot just take it off the market and be lumbered with trying to mind it again for the next five years”. Gloster said he was “more than happy to dispose of it on the interstate agency transfer system”. So why didn’t that happen?
“If somebody wants it, they can have it, within the guidelines and rules, but if they don’t, we’re going to sell it,” Gloster said. This kind of chat is more akin to a couple bargaining with each other about whether that bloody sideboard that’s been gathering dust in the garage should go on DoneDeal or not, as opposed to a wonderful building that could actually be put to use.
Ivana Bacik, James Geoghegan and other TDs have raised concerns about the sale.
There appears to be something of an issue here with regards to which agency tells the other it has something on the books that’s going, and at what point each agency - the HSE or the LDA - springs into action to figure out whether it should be kept in public ownership and made of use.
The LDA cannot profess ignorance to the building being sold, because the intention to sell was previously reported. And yet it does seem that the Section 53 Notice was issued quite late in the day.
Gloster’s language around being “lumbered” with an amazing building is a choice term. This building is not an individual senior civil servant’s millstone, it’s an opportunity.
Why do we sell things that might clearly be of use?
We are crying out for large buildings to be put to use. An obvious use would be conversion to public housing, or other publicly-owned accommodation. While I think it’s worth having a discussion about what “key workers” actually are in a city (we often automatically cut to gardaí, nurses, and teachers, but what about artists, retail workers, cleaners, waiters and labourers?), this is an opportunity for some key worker public housing.
I’m not particularly inclined towards segregating housing by profession, because today that tends to be a marketing ploy by developers, as we saw with the rabbit hole our housing policy fell through around “co-living” developments – one of the most negatively disruptive policy moves made by Eoghan Murphy as minister.
He seemed to imagine people working in tech all wanted to share the same kitchen because of something to do with “transience”.
But if we must make such decisions due to acute needs across so many demographics, this should be an opportunity to house the many students who would love to have a city centre flat in publicly-owned student housing.
Equally, it would be a fantastic opportunity for the Department of Culture or Dublin City Council to develop residential artist studios. Given its heritage, this would be a great building to house student nurses, junior doctors, and other hospital and healthcare workers crippled with rents and commutes. Can somebody, anybody, just use their imagination?
Countless mistakes have been made regarding selling off or just ignoring the potential of incredibly valuable assets in Dublin city. Look at what happened to the Iveagh Markets in the Liberties. What could be a community gem was allowed to fall into a state of disrepair.
Look at the heartbreaking sight of Aldborough House in Dublin 1, one of the finest buildings in the city, now with the ignominious label of being among An Taisce’s top 10 most at risk buildings nationally.
Why do we sell things that might clearly be of use? Why is there so little institutional comprehension and appreciation of the broader value of significant buildings – rather than this sense of being “lumbered” with them?
Why is Baggot Street Hospital being sold off at all?
