Templeogue

Templeogue (Dublin 6W) is a suburb of southwest Dublin, in Ireland. Its name derives from the Irish Teach Mealóg, meaning St. Melog's house or church - a mediaeval monastery, in fact.

Location

Templeogue lies between the surrounding suburbs of Terenure, Rathfarnham, Knocklyon, Kimmage, Walkinstown and Tallaght.

It is separated from Tallaght by the M50 motorway. A series of pedestrian bridges provide cyclists and pedestrians access to Tallaght.

It is well situated, being 4 miles (6 km) from the city centre and equally close to the Dublin Mountains, and to the coast at Dublin Bay on the Irish Sea. It is 180 feet (55 m) above sea level at 53° 18' north and 6° 18' west. The River Dodder forms the southern border with Rathfarnham while the River Poddle (the river that forms the black pool at the Liffey confluence that gives Dublin it's name) forms the Northern Border. Templeogue is unique in that the "Village" is not in the centre of the district, instead the Orwell Shopping Centre in front of the large recreational field, Orwell Green, is. One of the most prominent views is of Montpelier Hill to the southwest, topped by the ruin of the Hellfire Club at 1,250 feet (380 m).

Estates

Templeogue comprises many housing estates. These include Cypress Downs, Cypress Grove Road/North/South, Orwell Park, Rossmore, Kennington/Wilderwood/Rushbrook, Willington, The Water Course, Osprey, Glendown, Domville, Templeogue Lodge and Templeogue Wood.

The suburb also has many open fields (such as the colloquially known Orwell Green and Glendown Green), sports clubs - Faugh's GAA Club, St. Judes GAA Club, St. Mary's Rugby Club and Templeogue United FC, as well as schools - St. MacDara's CC (highly respected for being a mixed sex school and non-denominational), Bishop Galvin NS and Bishop Shanahan NS primary schools and Templeogue College.

The Water Course is known for once backing onto the river Poddle which, according to local legend, "disappeared" overnight. In reality, it was made into an underground river to allow expansion of the St Judes Parish Church. It was also the site of a murder in 2000. The St Judes Parish church is a landmark in southwest Dublin. Along with the nearby Greenhills church, it has striking architecture not found in typical Irish churches (slanty roof). The residents of Domville petitioned for their estate to be cut off from Cypress Downs to reduce traffic. This was done when large bollards containing shrubbery were placed in the middle of Domville Avenue. This area is known as the "Orwell" or "Tymon" side and borders Terenure, Tallaght, Greenhills, Perrystown, Kimmage and Walklinstown. The river Poddle or "Rat River" is the local river.

The estates of Cypress Grove North, Cypress Grove South, Ashfield, Cypress Grove Road, Corrybeg, Hilcrest, Springfield, Knocklyon Road and Templeogue Village make up the rest of Templeogue known as the "Village". Most of these estates are located on the N81. The "Village" houses landmarks such as the Morgue Pub, Templeogue Bridge, the Templeogue Mansions, The Spawell Dome and a large motorway Junction. The Spawell is sports recreation centre with many tennis courts, indoor badminton and football pitches and squash courts, as well as a Pitch and Putt Club. It is also used as a local meeting area. It also has a night club, restaurant, arcade, snooker room and bar. It caused controversy when it closed its go kart track in the 1990's and then opened a carnival in 2004. The Cheeverstown Centre is a home for people with learning or physical disabilities and is only across the road from another centre for people with (less severe) learning disabilities - St. Michael's House. The River Dodder is the local river on this side. This side borders Rathfarnam, Knocklyon, Terenure and Tallaght.

Development

Formerly, Templeogue was a small village isolated from the city until 1801 when the Templeogue Road was constructed, originally as a toll road.

Urban expansion of Dublin in the late 1950s and early 1960s promoted residential development of the countryside and the population of Templeogue grew quickly. A further wave of home building followed in the 1970s and 80s by which time most open land in the neighbourhood was developed to capacity.

Templeogue was one of the first neighbourhoods in Ireland to enjoy access to a shopping centre when the Rathfarnham Shopping Centre was completed in the early 1970s, just across the River Dodder. It was the second supermarket built in Ireland, after Cornelscourt Shopping Centre.

The arrival of the centre displaced established grocery home-delivery services. Milk and bread used to be delivered by men working for the dairies and bakeries, while root vegetables and cabbage were sold from the back of a lorry by an independent operator who computed the bill with a pencil and brown paper.

The supermarket phenomenon smashed dietary traditions by introducing peculiar novelties such as yoghurt, kiwi fruit, curry powder, grapefruit, garlic and cheeses. Thus, Templeogue found itself during a brief interval in the 1970s at the front line of the Irish culinary avant-garde.

The first Dodder bridge in Templeogue, Templeogue Bridge, was built in about 1800. When the Rathfarnham Shopping Centre was constructed half a mile downstream from there, a second bridge was added, right behind the centre.

Templeogue was also one of the first Irish neighbourhoods to benefit from cable television service in 1971-2, when a 125-foot television mast (known as the communal aerial) was erected on vacant ground, normally occupied by unsupervised children, between Templeville Road and Fortfield Drive (in nearby Terenure). Previously, Irish television and weak British television signals were received on large rooftop aerials and viewed on black and white receivers. British transmissions were sometimes further spoiled by transient atmospheric degradations, especially under strong anticyclonic conditions during summer evenings. Good weather–bad television pictures.

Elaborate antennae on the new mast received and amplified struggling British UHF colour television signals (BBC 1, BBC 2, UTV and Harlech–HTV) transmitted from Northern Ireland and Wales.

The northern signals spilled into the Republic and stretched into Dublin City through a convenient gap in the Naul Hills in north County Dublin while the Welsh signals came in clearly across the Irish Sea. The signals were fed into local homes by coaxial cable, the system being referred to at the time as piped TV or the pipe.

Reckless children who climbed to the top of the mast savoured panoramic views of the entire city, the bay and the mountains, and dizzying views of their homes, far below. The mast has since been dismantled as signals are now collected on a mountaintop.

The arrival of amplified British colour television signals promoted sales of colour television receivers in the neighbourhood. Colour television was a recent development and, prior to the erection of the community mast, a mere handful of people had made the costly investment in colour receivers and the special tall rooftop antennae needed to intercept useful colour signals that had travelled many miles, far beyond their intended service area.

While the population of Templeogue once again pioneered the Irish Experience by learning how to watch colour television, the colour balance on many receivers was heavily oversaturated so that pale and smooth British and Ulster newsreaders appeared to viewers to be savagely disfigured by horrible red, orange and purple radiation burns and disturbingly-textured skin cancers. Most private rooftop aerials were taken down after the pipe was installed, improving the appearance of the neighbourhood, at least.

Homes

Templeogue is mostly populated by middle class residents—native Dubliners and former rural dwellers. It is a safe area to raise a family and has plenty of necessary amenities close to hand. Though regarded by many as a desirable address, the original housing as built in the early 1960s was equal to homes in other less desired areas in the city, most houses being ordinary, semi-detached, pebble-dashed dwellings.

Corrections to the original specifications have been applied by the residents, most vitally to the heating. Over the years many have retired the original coal-fuelled fireplaces, downstairs, and installed oil- or gas-fuelled central heating systems. Some have also fitted double-glazed windows and attic insulation to improve comfort in winter. The houses were so dreadfully insulated that new heating systems would have failed unless winter draughts were repelled also.

In many cases, showers have been installed to replace the original bathtubs, or have been added to the baths. Other popular improvements include building one or two extra rooms on top of garages and adding enclosed porches at the front doors.

Perhaps the best feature of some of these houses is the relatively generous size of the rear gardens which are often notably spacious compared to similar houses in other areas of the city, and which are appreciated by adults and children, alike.

In 1965, a three-bedroomed home cost £4,000. By 2005, in the wake of the Irish economic boom (the Celtic Tiger), typical homes in the suburb could fetch €500,000. In other words, properties values have multiplied by 125 times in 40 years.

Amenities

Templeogue achieved suburban maturity by the mid-1970s with most desirable facilities in place, or easy access to them nearby, including schools, swimming pools, shopping, pubs, an excellent public park, sports grounds, and a modest neighbourhood newsletter, The Templeogue Telegraph.

Originally a quiet area, traffic through Templeogue increased sharply through the 1980s and congestion became normal.

Although surrounded by pubs in adjacent neighbourhoods, Templeogue has only one pub inside its boundaries, The Templeogue Inn, better known throughout Dublin as The Morgue. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the number 15 Blessington steam tram passed through Templeogue so close to the road that many deaths occurred. Corpses were often sheltered in the pub until taken away and the pub acquired the permanent, morbid nickname relished by the natives.

The Morgue was the most expensive pub in Ireland for a time during the 1980s when it changed hands for £660,000, a remarkable sum at the time. Inflation of property values has driven pub prices far higher since then.

James Joyce

No discussion of Dublin, or of even a portion of Dublin, is complete without examining what James Joyce would have said about it.

Joyce mentions Templeogue only once, in Finnegans Wake, Book III, Episode 3, page 553, line 12:

This article is licenced under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Templeogue".

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