Small Town Writer

Praise be the Credit Union

Pensioners and welfare seekers number large among those who stand in line outside the town’s public and private concerns dispensing riches. Thursdays, before opening time, there is a queue outside the Post Office for payouts. Recently the government decided to move our Post Office from the main thoroughfare to a dark corner of a modern piazza. Rumours flew around that the PO was being shut down. There were no denials. The shortage of good PR was such that even the staffers did not appear to know their fate.

The new office is small and a cheerless, as much for the clientele, as the civil servants parked behind its bullet proof glass.

Outside the main banks most days to the week, clusters of people block the sidewalks waiting for the countdown. Banks do not unbolt their doors until ten and sometimes 10:30 am; and if you are thirty seconds late at closing time, too bad. The bankers issued much ballyhoo in the past about how IT would provide more time for staff to spend with their customers. We would all cuddle up together and nothing would be much trouble.

Post Crunch, banks are not recruiting and those who leave are not being replaced. Unless they are big shots, that is.

The Credit Union remains the most humane of money dispensaries in our town.

Child labour?

Morning sightings of children burdened by the weight of books labouring on foot to school bring to mind pictures of Victorian scenes of child labour. Parents complain publicly of the possibility that such physical toil may bring on physical deformities. The response from the teachers is that they need so many tomes in order to keep up with the broad curriculum. Capitalism, it seems, has found another way of bestowing hardship on children in a perfectly legal way and more arguments in favour of parents who deliver their children by automobile to the school’s front door.

uh-oh

(Right: Work outside
Greystones railway station,
January 2009. Photo McNiff)

DOUBTS ARISE AS TRAFFIC
PROJECT NEARS CLOSE

At the town’s busy commuter hub beside the train station, finely cut blocks of granite have been laid. Pavements have been expanded outwards, narrowing the road for vehicles. New parking bays for drivers and public transport have been zoned and carved out. But just as the €500,000 project nears the finishing line doubts have arisen among our elected representatives.

Passengers will be able to watch people drawing money from the local bank’s hole in the wall, one councillor said. Of course, it is for the bank to preserve the privacy of the bank's customers, not the Town Council.

The whole area is too narrow, traffic will be gridlocked, was another criticisms; and a bus driver’s representative voiced concerns about the bus bay being able to accommodate one bus at a time when there other private bus companies to be considered, each one arriving during rush hour periods.

The dissent will continue and the consultants who planned the scheme will be the target. What could they have been thinking of?

Well, one consideration might be that one day soon – say fity years from now – gas will be rationed for public transport only.  There may be none at all for private motorists.

Papering over truth when facts run short

 Our town rises early. By the time the farmers relieve their herds of milk, yesterday’s yield is on our table with the dailies, breaking yesterday’s news. Postmen have pigeonholed several tons of mail, stacked vans with parcels and packed their sacks for deliveries.

TRUTH DID YE SAY?

On the screen before me there is evidence aplenty of activity in cyberspace: bloggers, spammers and hackers and updaters and e-mailers. It’s all graft. In the background, the radio blathers on about this and that, papering over the cracks with speculation whenever facts run out or truth breaks down. For good and ill, much has changed swiftly in fifty years of our small town life. Yet, the basic human requirements for the living in small urban towns remain. We all need shelter, a regular income, food and space to take our leisure.

BREAD AND BUTTER TIME

This place is deemed a dormer town, which means a routine of sleep here and toil elsewhere for the majority of students and working adults. Service and light industries are alive to the bust and competition but the boom is over. It is bread and butter time.

We were spared the pollution of factory development but, business parks better suited to the education of our population, elude us. House construction gathered momentum in the 1970s soared into the stratosphere of high prices in the ’90’s until its collapse in 2009. The rapid spread of concrete and asphalt over once green fields alarmed many. The redevelopment of an old and dilapidated Victorian harbour, well past its usefulness, angered others but its construction continues.

Scary stuff from RTE Radio commander

Clare Duignan, back in RTE Radio as managing director after a lousy record  in television continues to lead her charmed life. “Very real challenges now face RTÉ Radio,” she says announcing the  latest schedule.* Hey, it's a scary world out here away from the careworn corridors of RTE power.