Wolfe Tone Park, also known as Wolfe Tone Square is a public space in Dublin, Ireland. Named for Theobald Wolfe Tone (1763–1798), the park is the site of a graveyard that was attached to St. Mary’s Church. The graveyard was deconsecrated in 1966 and laid out as a green park. In 1998, Dublin City Council held an international competition to redesign the park, which was won by Peter Cody of Boyd Cody Architects.
The park is the final resting place of the United Irishman Archibald Hamilton Rowan (1751–1834), Mary Mercer, founder of Mercer’s Hospital (died 1734), the philosopher Francis Hutcheson (1694–1746), Sir Boyle Roche, 1st Baronet (1736–1807), an Irish politician and member of the Irish House of Commons, parish rector William Fletcher (1715–1771),[2] and Lord Norbury (1745–1831; known colloquially as the hanging judge).
Since the park layout was changed back in 2002, the park had been made available by Dublin City Council for events – such as the Dublin Fringe Festival. However, following a campaign from local residents to restore “Wolfe Tone Park as a non-commercial green space” Dublin undertook what they referred to as the Wolfe Tone Park & Street Environmental Improvement Scheme.
Wolfe Tone Park & Street Environmental Improvement Scheme offers a new destination point for all, as an ever-changing civic space where daily life and spectacle collide. The contextual design offers a thriving and inviting multi-use urban space for all ages and abilities, to be treasured by residents, workers and visitors. The design consists of two phases:
Phase one, the redesign and refurbishment of Wolfe Tone Street to create a more pedestrian friendly environment with new public lighting and street furniture and the use of a historic materials palette, creating both a high quality environment and character area.
Phase two involves the refurbishment of Wolfe Tone Park, everything within the park has been designed with intent: from the proposed new feature lawn, the retention of the existing mature trees, the proposed horticulture, to conservation and recognition of the parks history as a graveyard.
The new design for Wolfe Tone Park & Street Environmental Improvement Scheme will provide a green oasis and destination point in the heart of Dublin’s bustling city centre.
CELTIC HIGH CROSS ON LEHAUNSTOWN LANE – SEE IT IN CONTEXT WHILE YOU CAN
This cross will remain but the context or setting is likely to disappear within the next few years.
I try to visit this area on a regular basis but because of Covid-19 restrictions I have been unable to visit for more than a year and I am beginning to become very concerned about the future of this country lane. Effectively the lane is public but every time that I visit access to the fields and sites along the lane has reduced. This visit I could not access the old church and graveyard or the old cross in the field across the lane from the church.
I would now describe Lehaunstown Lane as nothing more that a public path through a massive building site and I suspect that the hedgerows will disappear within two or three years. When all the development projects have been completed it is likely that the area will become a POPS [Privately Owned Public Space] which is not at all good.
I am willing to bet than most Dubliners do not know of this place or that if they see the name they will assume that it is a misspelling of Loughlinstown [which is nearby]. To add to the confusion the tram stop is Laughanstown but the laneway leading to Tully Church is Lehaunstown.
As you walk along a lonely country lane from the LUAS tram stop at Laughanstown to the old church at Tully the first thing of note that you will see is a well preserved high cross. The cross was saved from destruction by James Grehan in the later part of the nineteenth century. The road next to the cross was being lowered and James Grehan had this small wall built and the cross placed upon it at its original height.
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