O’ Connell Bridge spans the River Liffey and joins the North Side and South Side of Dublin. O’Connell Bridge is unique in Europe as it is the only bridge that is wider than it is long. Today the bridge marks the very centre of Dublin as it joins O’Connell Street to D’Olier Street.
Originally the bridge was named the Carlisle Bridge after the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland at the time, Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle. The bridge was designed by James Gandon, a famous Irish architect whose name is associated with many of the great Georgian buildings in Dublin. The construction of the bridge took three years and was completed in 1794.
It wasn’t until 1879 that more work took place on the bridge when it was decided that the bridge should be widened to allow greater traffic flow. The bridge was widened to the same width of Sackville Street, now O’Connell Street. The bridge was reopened in 1882 it was renamed in honour of Daniel O’Connell and a statue in his honour was erected.
O’Connell had been a famous lawyer who campaigned for the repeal of the Union between Ireland and the UK. He only used non-violent means and for this he has been remembered as a hero. He stands in stark contrast against the IRA and the UDF who used bloodshed to achieve nothing other than to tear apart a province with violence.
O’Connell Bridge isn’t the only bridge so named, the second being the bridge that spans the pond in St Stephens Green. In 2004 a number of pranksters installed a plaque on O’Connell Bridge dedicated to Farther Pat Noise, a fictitious priest. The plaque remains on O’Connell Bridge to this day and wasn’t noticed by the Dublin County Council until May 2006.
Ronan Menton is the webmaster for a number of travel related websites and has been for some time in Ireland, associated with search engine optimisation in the Irish travel industry. He spends two months a year in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and now sees it as his second home. Among the many sites he is currently working on are the following: Car Rental in Ireland and International Car Rentals.com.
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