suburbs

suburbs. Walls (see walled towns) protected most urban dwellers for the first millennium of Irish urbanization, but even in the 12th century the Anglo‐Norman capture and refortification of Hiberno‐Norse centres (notably Dublin, Waterford, and Cork) led to the partial or complete exclusion of the earlier citizenry beyond the walls. Other suburban settlements (the Irishtowns of Kilkenny and Limerick) may have developed in tandem with the Norman citadels that overshadowed them as they became centres of artisan activity. The Franciscan and Dominican religious orders generally chose sites outside the walls and these often formed the nucleus for secular development. In the case of Dublin, by 1300 most of the city was located outside the walls, partly on the north side of the river. Suburban settlements there and elsewhere bore the brunt of warfare in the 14th and 15th centuries, and some disappeared at that period or were incorporated inside walled towns.

The resurgence of suburban development around 16th‐century Dublin and elsewhere in the early 17th century was a measure of general urban expansion; it was also because of the clustering of craft activities not suited or not welcome in the urban core. Liberties, notably that of St Thomas and Donore south‐west of Dublin's walls, became distinctive urban communities outside the jurisdiction of their parent city. The religious purges during and after the Confederate War either temporarily or permanently swelled the suburbs of leading corporate towns and contributed to the religious segregation evident for example in 18th‐century Cork.

However, in the long cycle of city growth, sharp distinctions emerged between types of suburban settlement: old artisanal neighbourhoods (Blackpool in Cork and Ballymacarett abreast of Belfast); new areas of high‐status residential development (Ballsbridge and Clontarf outside Dublin); and satellite settlements centred on specialized economic activities such as textile finishing, quarrying, or seafaring (Douglas, in the case of Cork, Palmerstown, Rathgar, and Ringsend in the case of Dublin). And by the early 19th century there was a swathe of villa residences inhabited by the well‐to‐do pioneering commuters around Irish cities; they in turn were serviced from the satellite villages.

Railway construction in the 1830s and 1840s created the first commuter suburbs of Dublin (Blackrock, Kingstown) and the pattern was repeated slightly later around Belfast and Cork. The horse omnibus, the horse tram, and towards the end of the century the electric tram articulated the process. Only in greater Dublin did independent township authorities emerge in the mid‐19th century; some of these were controlled by private landowners (e.g. Pembroke), railway companies (Kilmainham), or a tight group of speculative developers (Rathmines). All but Kingstown/Dún Laoghaire were absorbed into Dublin corporation in the early 20th century.

Three processes transformed the scale of suburbanization in 20th‐century Ireland: the pronounced general growth of towns since the 1920s; the huge local authority programmes for the rehousing of the inner‐city working classes; and transport changes, first cheap motor‐bus services and later the popularization of car ownership. Thus by the end of the century most Irish people resided in what technically were suburbs.

Bibliography

Graham, B. J., and Proudfoot, L. J. (eds.), An Historical Geography of Ireland (1993)

David Dickson