Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 17 July 2014

Cork City Events, Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

751a. Ford Consul Cortina Ad, 1962

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town,

Cork Independent, 17 July 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 83) –Stylising the Landscape”

“Outside the little stream, where the cart wheels were shod I meandered idly by. And the circular platform was still in place. It looked as if the owner had one day got weary of the struggle…then he closed the doors of the little social centre, where the neighbours had met and discussed happenings, far and near, through the generations…some of the craft had survived by adapting their forge to the art of welding and the repair of the new agricultural machinery used in farming: but they were only a minority” (John T Collins, “The Deserted Forge”, Hollybough, 1963).

 

In October 1967, as related in last week’s column, Taoiseach Jack Lynch at the opening of the £2m investment into the Ford Factory on the Marina marked not only change for Ford but also for the motoring population. Lynch during his address related that his government had to cut back on the country’s loss making railway system and spent vast sums on the Irish road networks; “we have had to impose speed limits and complicated systems of traffic control in our towns and cities, while the need to cater for the projected increase in car numbers has been a major factor in the planning of future towns and rural development”. Newspapers like the Hollybough (see above quote), the Cork Examiner and Evening Echo commented on change regularly since the first motor car rolled across the Cork street in the 1910s all the way through to the problem of parking and traffic movement in the 1960s. One I came across recently was the installation of the first set of traffic lights in July 1954 at the junction of Washington Street and the Grand Parade (60 years old since this installation this month). Erected by Messrs Siemens, London, the lights were of a similar type to those being used in some other Irish cities, except that in Cork pedestrian lights were introduced to work in conjunction with the regular lights.

Car dealerships spread and grew with the growth of Irish motoring and there were 87 main Ford dealers in the country in 1966. Fords could record that 11,041 out of 39,546 new car owners chose one of the 12 cars Ford had to offer. The Ford Cortina, introduced in 1962, during its production run was the biggest selling model ever on the Irish market. Next on the range were the Ford Corsair and the Ford Anglia followed by the new range of Ford Zephyr and Ford Zodiac models. The Cork Examiner in October 1967 commented on their affect on the urban and rural landscapes of the country; “Mechanical refinements of independent rear suspension, along with sophisticated styling.. these new cars have become as much of the social scene as their imposing size and impressive appearance would suggest”.

Then there was the sister factory Dagenham in east London, which was the largest motor exporting factory in the world. The first vehicle, a Model AA truck, rolled off its production line in October 1931. In the post war years Dagenham turned its interests to the revolutionary Consul and Zephyr range of cars. Major expansion in the 1950s increased floor space by 50% and doubled production. By 1953 the site occupied four million square feet and employed 40,000 people. An article in the Hollybough in 1954 related that 75 per cent of the Irish in the Dagenham area, circa a total of 3,300 men, were employed there. An old North Monastery boy, Michael J Ronayne, with more than 30 years experience with the company in Cork and Dagenham, was the Chief Engineer in Europe of the Ford organisation. His brother jack was engineer in charge of the building of Gurranabraher and Spangle Hill houses.

As the swinging 60s took hold, Dagenham moved on to a car destined to become one of the favourites – the Ford Cortina. By the time the last Cortina left the line in 1982, the plant had built over three million. In Cork and Dagenham and further afield, Ford technologists, in the search for higher standards, contacted Swedish experts in industrial ventilation and air-handling, Svenska Fläktfabriken. They were world leaders in the complex problems of mining ventilation, they took up a leading role in the equally difficult task of providing the highly specialised conditions for car-body finishing.

The opening of the Cork factory extension in 1967 coincided with ceremonies celebrating the advent of first a tractor factory which sent machines to all parts of the world. With such heritage, service was also of vital importance to the farming community. The ready availability of spare parts from the 38 Ford Tractor Dealers strategically placed throughout Ireland ensured rapid and efficient service for owners and operators of Ford Tractors. In addition, the Agricultural Colleges National Ploughing Championships were initiated in 1966 and sponsored by Henry Ford & Son Ltd., Cork with the intention of stimulating interest in a wider understanding of the skills and values of good ploughing and tillage methods. Prizes of £300 and £150 were awarded to the winners of the Championships. After competitors from all the agricultural colleges had completed qualifying tests under National Ploughing Association rules the successful candidates contested the finals at the National Ploughing Championships.

To be continued…

Captions:

751a. Consul Cortina Ad 1962 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Question to the City Manager and Motions, Cork City Council Meeting, 14 July 2014

Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

Question to the City Manager:

 

To ask the City Manager, what is the future plan for the 9 unsold affordable houses in Kilbrack Grove, Skehard Road? Residents were given assurances at the time of purchase in the estate by the Council that they would be only Affordable housing and that this would not change.  Planning was sought for affordable housing – not social- can this suddenly change? Assurances were given to the residents and local councillors that these would only ever be an Affordable estate- can the council go back on their word? Nine Social houses in an estate of 41 is almost a 25% split- this seems large? This will affect people’s home value significantly- will they be compensated by Cork City Council? (Cllr Kieran McCarthy)

 

 

Motions:

 

That the north west lamp on St Patrick’s Bridge, closest one to Camden Quay, be fixed (Cllr Kieran McCarthy)

That in light of numerous tour buses parking by St Finbarre’s Cathedral, that a tour bus parking bay be re-instated (Cllr Kieran McCarthy)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 10 July 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

750a. An Taoiseach, Jack Lynch cutting the tape with Mr Tom Brennan, Managing Director

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 10 July 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 82) –The Ford Expansion”

 

“For 50 years the Ford Company has been part of the industrial life of this city but of course Fords links with Cork go back much further. The story of Henry Ford, whose father emigrated from Ballinascarty 120 weary years ago is so well-known that much of it is already folklore. Indeed the record of his life and achievements looms large in the history of the development of modern industrial methods, many of which he devised and brought to perfection” (part of speech, An Taoiseach Jack Lynch, Ford Factory, Cork, 11 October, 1967,)

The decade of the 1960s also brought new opportunities to the Ford manufacturing plant in Cork’s Marina. The special supplement in the Cork Examiner in October 1967 describes that it was the post World War II years that really saw the major growth in car assembly. Since 1946, Ford had almost invariably taken around one-third of the car market total and an even higher share of the commercial vehicle figure. Since the 1950s, Ford consistently captured between 25 per cent and 35 per cent of the Irish car market, and between 35 and 40 per cent of the Irish commercial vehicle market. It had an impressive record – taking passenger and commercial vehicles together, it was the best market share of any Ford Company in the world. The Cork Ford Plant turned out the widest range of vehicles under one badge on the Irish market with some 14 different passenger models and a wide selection of commercials. The total Ford area covered 33 acres and the growth of the factory increased more than 200 per cent in the decade between 1956 and 1966. By 1967, it had about 1,000 employees assembling cars and commercial vehicles for use throughout the Republic.

When the Cork plant came to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary in 1967, it was a working celebration. Tom Brennan, who had taken over as Managing Director from John O’Neill in 1959, had persuaded Ford’s European Management to invest £2m in Cork. He believed this was necessary in order to bring car production up to the very highest standards prevailing in Europe. Tom Brennan had first entered the gates of the Ford plant in May 1922, when he was 16 years of age. In his first ten years he worked in various departments in Cork and was transferred to the works in Dagenham in 1932. His top appointment while in England was as Area Sales Manager. He rejoined the firm in Cork in 1955 as General Sales Manager and became Managing Director.

The man Tom Brennan chose to implement the expansion was a fellow Corkman, Paddy Hayes, who, some years later, was to succeed him as Managing Director of Ford of Ireland. The £2m was spent on re-building, re-equipping and modernising the assembly plant, which became not only the largest factory of its kind but also the most modern. Half a million pounds was invested in an ultra modern body-finishing department, with Europe’s largest ‘slipper-dip’ immersion under-coating tank guaranteeing a high-quality base for final paint coatings. The remainder of the assembly plant was completely re-organised, re-equipped and re-housed in new light-alloy, unitary construction buildings covering an area of over 117,000 square feet. This meant two separate final-assembly lines, one for heavy commercial vehicles and the second and major unit for passenger and light commercial vehicles. Incorporated in the new facilities was a parts-and-accessories building holding millions of parts, representing a stock of over 23,000 separate items. The factory extensions virtually reversed the plant orientation since the previous wharf-side entrance was closed and all traffic now entered by Centre Park Road- known locally as Ford’s Road.

The official opening ceremony of the new buildings took place on 11 October 1967. The Taoiseach Jack Lynch, headed the 350 guests at the Marina Plant in the morning and there he cut a tape to symbolise the opening of the modern plant. The plant was blessed by Bishop Lucey. The Taoiseach who was accorded a military guard of honour, and the guests were taken on a short tour of the factory culminating in seeing completed cars driven off the assembly lines. Both were attended to by Thomas Brennan, the Managing Director and Ballincollig born Sir Patrick Hennessy, Chairman of Ford Motor Company, England and Chairman of Henry Ford & Son Ltd. He was educated at Christ Church School in Cork and served in World War I. Joining the new tractor factory in Cork after demobilisation he rose rapidly from his job in the foundry to become production manager and travelled extensively in Europe.

When Fords started in Dagenham Patrick joined them there as Purchase Manager and became General Manager just before the outbreak of the 1939 war. He served on the advisory council of the Ministry of Aircraft Production, and helped in the production of 34,000 RR Merlin engines for the RAF. For his services he was knighted in 1941. When the war ended he joined the board of the Ford Motor Company, became Managing Director in 1948, Deputy Chairman in 1950 and Chairman in April 1956.

To be continued…

 

Caption:

750a. An Taoiseach, Jack Lynch TD cutting the tape with Mr Tom Brennan, Managing Director, and Bishop Lucey on left and Lord Mayor, Pearse Wyse TD on right (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 3 July 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

749a. Albert Quay terminus, Cork City, 1930s

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 3 July 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 81) –An Auld Acquaintance”

 

Whilst Cork Airport was being built to great acclaim in 1960-61 (see last week), other transport routes also came under scrutiny. The Minister for Transport and Power, Erskine Childers, officially opened Cork’s new bus station at Parnell Place on Wednesday 12 October 1961. The building was blessed by Canon Fehily, Parish Priest of SS Peter and Paul’s Church, in the presence of the then Lord Mayor Sean Barrett TD, the architect J R Boyd Barrett and CIE Chairman Dr C S Andrews. The main contractor was P J Hegarty & Sons from Leitrim Street and its Franki piles were installed by the Irish Piling and Construction Company Ltd (Dublin and Cork). The Franki piling system (also called pressure-injected footing) is a method used to drive expanded base cast-in-situ concrete (Franki) piles.

In the course of his address Minister Childers praised CIE’s expansion of its modern road services. He also referred to an end of an era – CIE’s decision to close the railways of West Cork. He said that criticisms of rail closures were often based on sentimentalism and that claims that closure would result in heavy expenditure being placed on the region’s roads were exaggerated. Referring to reports and accounts of CIE for 1959/ 60, he noted that the average number of passengers carried on the West Cork trains was 30 and the average goods train was 45 tons, which were not sustainable to keep the line and its branch lines open.

Well known names were associated with the West Cork lines in times past. There was the famous engineer, Charles Nixon, under whose direction Chetwynd viaduct and the two tunnels on the line (Kilpatrick, near Innishannon and Gogginshill near Ballinhassig) were built. No less eminent was his assistant Joseph Philip Ronayne, who after years of engineering in California, was to become MP for Cork, 1872-1876). He was an Irish language enthusiast years and his home at Rushbrooke was called Rinn Ronain and the first two engines on the Bandon line bore Gaelic titles, Sighe Gaoithe and Rith Tinneagh (Whirlwind and Burning Fire). Noted investors were Major North Ludlow Beamish, the Earl of Bandon, T McCarthy Downing, Sir John Arnott, Lord Carbery, J Warren Payne, Colonel Travers, all of whom in their various times furthered the development of the lines. There were also the great men who staffed the trains – drivers, firemen and guards. The Cork Examiner remarked on the last day of the Cork-Bantry train on Friday 31 March 1961; “Whether it was coaxing a steam engine up the long defile at Gleann, west of Dunmanway, on handling the excited holiday crowds at Baltimore and Courtmacsherry, they did their jobs efficiently and without fuss, in all weathers and under all conditions. Never was there a mere loyal band than the railwaymen of West Cork”.

The Cork Examiner on Saturday 1 April 1961 gave a descriptive sentimental account of the last journey of the West Cork line. A Garda squad car trailed the last train on the West Cork line from Cork to Bantry. They were there to quash any violent protest by local residents served by the line and who were against the closure. On board a squad of uniformed Gardaí also travelled, and at every station the blue uniform was present. However, the media did not record violent demonstrations but sentimental ones. Since the first day in 1849, when the Bandon Railway was opened, this was probably the most unique trip ever made on the 112 old line – and the trip was taken by a strong squad of press reporters and photographers and a gathering of representatives of the Irish Railway Record Society as well as many who were making the sentimental journey.

Hundreds of well-wishers crowded the platform at Albert Quay. Children sought the autographs of the driver Tralee-born Dan Murphy, and the excitement and confusion, which marked the occasion, delayed the start for almost ten minutes. It was just after nine minutes past 6pm when Guard Denis Hannigan waved the green flag and to the double-noted blast of the hooter Dan Murphy eased engine ‘2660-2641’ away from the platform. The Cork Examiner recorded the surrounding fuss; “ Farewell cheers rose, ‘bus rolls’ streamed from the hands of CIE men over the labouring train; the staccato snap of fog signals crushed beneath her wheels, and the mournful wall of locomotive whistles signalled the departure of the last train to West Cork”.

As the train sped through the suburbs the various bridges over-looking the line were thronged. Out then into the country, over the Black Ash bridge, onto the Chetwynd Viaduct, where many a bowl player had been challenged to loft the bridge. Past the picturesque Bandon River through Clonakilty, Desert, Dunmanway, Drimoleague, Aghaville, Durrus Road and journeying onto Bantry. The schedule for the journey was one of continued interruptions by well-wishing local people. Every station was filled to capacity by sightseers, and travellers on this historic occasion and the progress of the train was delayed. On entering Bantry a multitude of fog signals and cheers were heard and as the train pulled out on her solitary lonely trip back to Cork, the hundreds of spectators sang “Should Auld Acquaintance be Forgot”.

To be continued…

 

Caption:

749a. Albert Quay Terminus, Cork City, 1930s, part of West Cork Railway Line (picture: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Comments, Colliers City Report, Cork City Council Meeting, 23 June 2014

Improve Your Life, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

The Colliers Report is a great plan with some great imagination in it. I think the sense of brain storming in it is something this city needs. Our city is the southern capital and we should accentuate this concept more.

 

A City of Welcomes:

As someone who has been giving walking tours around town for 21 years this summer, we need to develop the city as an experience – it is a city with great charm, pride and heart – one of the aspects that tourists always chat to me about is the charm, heart, feeling welcome and a friendly place, a place you find hard to forget – it’s size means we all have a somewhat good quality of life; in general average commute times are 20 minutes to and from the suburbs – there are traffic hot spots that need to be resolved but not to the extent of other European cities

 

Rebrand as a City of Festivals:

The City centre is significantly losing out to suburban shopping centres; we need to stop this leakage – the city needs to aggressively market itself much more – parking is an issue, upwards rent reviews, rates, dereliction are all problems but so are a wide range of other factors. I always think, we’re not really pulling the marketing of the city across the line –there is need to develop a package/ scheme where citizens want to and need to support the city centre. Even with the city’s 24 festivals – 100 days of festivals per year – some work well and bring masses of people in and others we need to work on and grow. The city needs to rebrand itself as a city of festivals – there is no reason why places like Galway and Dublin are taking much of that kudos as Irish festival capitals if we do as much work and even more in Cork.

2005- ten years on

The city consistently oversees a great quantity and high quality of cultural work – Next year marks ten years on since the European Capital of Culture years. The City needs use this point in time to see how we can market Cork’s culture more on a national and European level.

 

On the Waterfront:

Our waterfront only really becomes animated for four festivals a year – we need more waterfront activities – just compare ourselves to places like Dublin or further afield in Boston, Bristol and Liverpool. I’m not saying to become those places but they’re are ideas out there elsewhere that we can draw on to accentuate on what is already going on and  to showcase perhaps what should be going on in our river and waterfront area

 

We need the National Diaspora Centre:

City does need an international visitor site – this city needs to have the National Diaspora Centre – the city was a major player as a North Atlantic Port City – which we don’t tell the story of enough – the export of goods plus emigration stories are not explored and told enough to the citizen and visitor.

 

On Historic Quarters

We don’t harness our historic quarters enough – Shandon Craft Centre needs to be moved on – my preference is for the Council to work in tandem with the Shandon Area Renewal Association and the local festivals, to turn it into a community building.  In my own ward, Docklands, a quarter of enormous historical wealth, is not mined for its uniquenesses and how it could be used to rebrand the city’s link to the harbour and further afield. The city needs to create more Cork Community Art Links to work within the city and suburbs exploring the senses of places in different area bringing forth the sense of history and culture of what makes Cork different to other cities and why people should live shop and do business here.

 

A Student City:

I think as a city we don’t make enough of the 35,000 students we have here; The city has rightly berated some for their anti-social behaviour but we don’t accentuate enough the positives of how much of a student city we are and how much they contribute to our economy – from accommodation to food to night life. A city that looks after its young, its families and senior citizens are very attractive qualities.

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 26 June 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

748a. Sketch drawing for Cork Airport terminal buildings,1961

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 26 June 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 80) – A Symbolic Airport”

 

Continuing on from last week’s article and focussing on the development of an airport for Cork, the Cork Examiner in October 1961 profiled the development of the airport itself. In the late 1930s the idea of a sea plane base at Belvelly and its mudflats faded out of the picture. British Imperial Airways in conjunction with Pan-American Airways campaigned for a new seaplane base to be built at Southampton for a projected experimental air service between England and New York, via Bermuda. This dampened the hopes of a seaplane base in Cork Harbour. The Cork project was finally abandoned when Foynes was opened a few years later.

Meanwhile, in 1934 a group of aviation enthusiasts formed the Cork Aero Club and one of the principal aims of that body was the establishment of a city airport. In that year members surveyed various likely sites around the city and went into every aspect of the problem. They finally settled on Farmer’s Cross and in the same year, permission was granted by the Minister for Industry and Commerce for the use of Farmer’s Cross, as a regional airport. The Cork Aero Club could not finance the construction of an airport, which they regarded as a State or local government responsibility. In those years, the estimated cost of establishing an airport at Farmer’s Cross was £10,000. That airfield, however, was not then fully licensed because it did not have a sufficient runway to meet with commercial air regulation.

The years passed by with scheme after scheme proposed but nothing materialised. Foynes seaplane base prospered; Rinneanna Airport and Dublin Airport were opened but nothing was happening in Cork. The outbreak of the war in 1939 added to Cork’s wait. In the mid 1940s, it began to emerge that Farmer’s Cross was not considered suitable as the site for an airport in Cork. Ahanesk, which had been favoured in preference by the British experts several years previously, came into the news. This location of four to five hundred acres, just one mile west of Midleton, seemed to possess all the necessary requisites and preliminary survey work had been carried out by the County Council in the past.

The Department of Industry and Commerce sent observers to Cork to check on meteorological conditions over a period to determine from that aspect the most suitable site for an airport. They began their work at Ahanesk, avoided Farmer’s Cross and continued at nearby Ballygarvan. During the wait in the 1950s, the Cork Airways Company was established and they took over the Farmer’s Cross airfield from the Cork aero Club. In May 1948, the Farmer’s Cross airfield was officially opened by Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave. With a small set-up the airfield needed funding of £50,000 to extend to create a longer runway space. This finance was not forthcoming.

On 18 January 1954 the Department finally announced that the airport would be located at Ballygarvan, four miles south of the city. Three years later in September 1957, the land commission began to acquire land in the vicinity of Ballygarvan to the extent of approximately 420 acres. Once the formalities of taking over the land had been completed, contracts for the construction were signed and the work began. The top of Lehanagh Hill, six hundred feet above sea level, began to change its appearance as the bulldozers went to work levelling the site, skimming the tops and filling in the troughs. A million cubic feet of earth was shifted and the two 15-feet wide runways, one 6,000 feet and the other 4,300 feet, were laid on their twelve-inch deep bed of re-inforced concrete. A new concrete approach was also laid. The buildings began to be constructed, which included the control tower, offices, terminal building, restaurant, customs hall, and viewing balcony. The design and construction of the airport was entrusted to the Civil Aviation Section of the Department of Transport and power was also granted to them to manage the airport. The high quality graded aggregate and concrete products were supplied by William Ellis & Sons, Ballyvolane.

The first plane landed at Cork Airport on 12 October 1961. She was an Aer Lingus Fokker Friendship, piloted by two of the company’s senior captains, which was on a test flight. Captain Kelly Rogers noted to the press that because the airport was situated on a hill over the city, the approaches were very clear. The object of the flight was to test the route and the landing facilities at the airport, as well as to gain familiarity with the approaches.

Cork airport was opening officially on 16 October 1961 by the Taoiseach, Seán Lemass. He was also on the first plane to land at the new airport. He was greeted on his arrival by the Lord Mayor of Cork, Anthony Barry, TD and the Minister for Transport Erskine Childers. It was a busy day with operationally with twelve flight movements, six in and six outbound. Four of the planes landed were Aer Lingus and two were Cambrian Airways – these being the two operating companies.

To be continued…

 

Caption:

748a. Sketch drawing for Cork Airport terminal buildings, 1961 (source: Fifty Years have Flown, The History of Cork Airport, 2011)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 19 June 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

747a. Belvelly Castle, Great Island, Cork harbour overlooking the mudflats

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 19 June 2014

“Technical Memories (Part 79) – A Field of Enterprise”

 

The new airport in Cork symbolises our purpose and will help us in our desire to have the world see us as a modern progressive state, coming rapidly and fully into line with all others in modern equipment and facilities. There are no longer any doubts about the importance of air transport development or about our ability to achieve standards of proficiency as good as the best in any field of enterprise. Both as a symbol of our progress and of our purpose, and as an important contribution to the already buoyant economy of Cork, the coming into operational use of Cork Airport is a proper occasion for celebration (Seán Lemass, Cork Examiner, Tuesday morning, 17 October 1961, p.1).

Returning to exploring technical education and industrial progress in the decade of the 1960s, the opening of Cork City Airport was an enormous symbol of progress. Opening his address at the airport Taoiseach Seán Lemass said the opening would have a stimulating effect on the industry and trade of County Cork. He spoke about the effects to be experienced in every sector of economic activity and about the benefits of tourist traffic. He hoped that in many areas of the county, those engaged in the many businesses, which catered for holiday makers would prepare themselves for the increase in numbers which could be confidently expected. He also noted of a financial stimulus in the form of grants and loans for hotel extensions, some 24 hotels and four guest houses in Cork City and county has extended their accommodation by about 100 additional rooms.

The Cork Examiner in its special supplement the day after the opening related the evolution of the dream towards having an airport. One interesting throwback was presented that back in 1933, Richard O’Connor, one time Cork County Surveyor envisaged Cork Harbour as the obvious choice for a North European terminal airport. Unique in its geographical position as the most westerly harbour in Europe, situated on the track of the north Atlantic steamship routes and equipped to accommodate large liner traffic, the harbour was ideally situated for such a project. In those days, although the Atlantic had been crossed by an aeroplane, commercial crossings existed only in the minds of engineers. The popular belief was that by the late 1930s the crossing of the Atlantic by seaplane services would become an accomplished fact. In the light of those circumstances, it was essential that Cork’s airport should be set up at once if advantage was to be taken of liner traffic, so that air routes would be accomplished before the seaplane crossing of the Atlantic became practical business.

The main objective of the scheme was to gain control of English and continental transatlantic mail services and it was hoped and believed that a proportion of passenger and light goods traffic would, in the ordinary course, follow the mail routes. During those years in the mid-thirties, representatives of many of the principal British and European air lines came to Cobh to meet and board all fast east-bound Atlantic liners. The purpose of these visits was to facilitate American and other air-minded travellers by arranging for air transport to be ready when they landed later at Liverpool, Southampton, Cherbourg, Hamburg or elsewhere. At such places at that time there were fully equipped airports and aerodromes and it was felt that there were exciting prospects if the proposed facilities at Belvelly could save time from one to three days in getting to destinations in Europe.  

Richard O’Connor produced an ambitious plan for an airport to be built on the mud flats of Belvelly from which would radiate air routes to Dublin, Belfast, Glasgow, Liverpool, Hull, Rosslare, Pembroke, London and Cherbourg. The plan regarded it feasible to reclaim an area of 460 acres at Belvelly by constructing dams and suitable tidal sluices. This scheme proposed to construct runway measuring from three quarters of a mile to a mile and a quarter in length. The control buildings were to be on Fota Island where there was ample room for future expansion. The site was examined by land and from the air by several experienced airmen. Travellers disembarking from the liners at Cobh were to be brought the five miles to the airport. Side by side with Belvelly was to be a seaplane base at Cobh, with communication between seaplane and liner by fast motor tender.

In 1934, a sub committee consisting of representatives of the Cork Corporation, County Council was formed which accumulated a lot of data which they forwarded to President DeValera. The Local Authorities Airport Committee was set up and its first task was to engage a British firm of consultants to make a survey of the possibilities and prospects of establishing seaplane and airplane bases in Cork. In 1936, the consultants reported back. The report reiterated the belief that the seaplane would oust the aeroplane and that a good seaplane base might be of “even more ultimate importance to Cork City, where nature afforded the possibilities of such a base, than a good aerodrome which was immediate and permanent requirement”. The project continued to be debated and was never realised due to financial reasons.

To be continued…

 

Captions:

746a. Belvelly Castle, Great Island, Cork Harbour overlooking the mudflats, which were to be the site of an airport in the late 1930s (picture: Kieran McCarthy).