1923

Pokey houses

Notwithstanding the high cost, everyone will welcome the progress that the erection of twenty houses denotes. These, with the forty-three houses for ex-servicemen now almost nearing completion at Fairhill, will go a far way to relieve the congestion and remove some of the city slums.

They will provide decent dwellings for sixty Galway families, which is something to have achieved in these days of all-pervading destruction. But we could wish that Irish houses were built on more spacious lines.

Our engineers and architects have developed an unforgiveable tendency – born, no doubt of the conditions of environment and financial circumstance – to build as if land were a thousand pound an inch, and to plan rooms that are more like canary cages than the dwellings of human beings.

The value of spacious rooms, well windowed and aired, cannot be overestimated. They make life brighter, cheerier and better, and they make the home a place to take pride in living in, not a stifling hutch to avoid as much as possible.

Ireland, for its size, probably possesses more stunted dwellings than any other country in the world; and not content with this dominant characteristic, we have been burning to the ground the all-too-few mansions that relieve the monotony of rural and town life.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App

Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.

Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.

Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite  HERE.

Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.