Last night (Tuesday 18th April2006) saw the very first tara Session Gigs kick off at the Dice Bar, Queen Street Dublin with great music from Longtails and Alice Jago.
Organised by Tarawatch, these weekly gigs are intended to raise awareness of the campaign to save tara and the archaeology of the Skryne Valley from the proposed motorway, and of course to raise some much needed shekels for the fight. No entrance fee, free music and a good cause were enough to tempt a good turn-out for the first gig – and it was a great way to spend a Tuesday evening.

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Stuck in traffic for up to 2.5 hours on wet mornings, it can be hard to believe that Navan already has a railway, and that you could be in Dublin in approximately 65 minutes on it. read full story / add a comment

In the run up to the 90th anniversary of 1916 many wondered how best to mark the event. Some marched the day before, some a few hours after. But the teflon Taoiseach trod where few men dared. At 12.00 he was at the GPO to commemorate an insurrection against imperialism. At 15.00 he was sending the troops in against an anti-imperialist demonstration. read full story / add a comment

An alliance of contemporary women activists from a broad coaition of campaigning groups, Anti-War, including Cosantoiri Siochana, Dublin Catholic Worker group, Residents Against Racism, Save tara and Shell to Sea have come together to honour the Women of 1916, who have been ignored by the State's commerorations and the Military Parade.
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Celebrate 1,916,000 years of heritage at tara

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TaraWatch will join with others in protest against the sale of historical artefacts at Adams and Sons Auctioneers, Stephen's Green, on Wednesday 12th April at 11.30 am. read full story / add a comment

A fundraising gig is being organised by TaraWatch for the campaign to save the Hill of tara from the M3 motorway. It will be held in Tuesday April 18th at Dice Bar, on the corner of Queen Street and Benburb Street, in Smithfield, off Aaran Quay on the Northside of the city.

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Harold's Cross Park celebrated it's centenary in 1994. A plaque commemorates the endowment of the Victorian Park to the people of the Rathmines/Harold's Cross townland. Cllr Mary Frehill performed the dedication ceremony. The park is a protected structure in its whole integrity including the original railings, the promenade ring, the hankerchief tree which commerorates the Women's Laundry strike and the view of the chapel and cemetry at Mount Jerome.
Today at 11am, I walked to the park with my daughter to find the park be-ribboned and works ongoing which are dedicated to the removal of the Victorian (or Edwardian ) railings, for 'safety reasons'.
There has been no planning notice to this effect on the railings or access points to the park. There has been no public consultation with the residents of the area as to the plans undertaken by Dublin City Council. When I started to take photographs I was threatened by a council worker that he would take a photo of me and that he would call the gardai, thus I confined my mobile camera to the pretty ribbons, until braver people came along. I asked a park keeper if this work would not affect the visual integrity of the park and if planning permission had been sought. He replied that as it was a safety excerise, that he did not believe that permissions were required. The protected structures within the park: two red-brick out-buildings are protected but the park itself was under the jurisdiction of the council. Councillor Frehill, when contacted stated that the works were going to be stopped pending a site visit this evening and a look at the plans for works. There has been in effect a complete stoppage of works until the reason for works and plans are inspected, under enforcement regulations.
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It has been long observed that people for some reason on their non-banking days readily absorb shite about Dangerous Places, Famous People, Sensible Saving Options, Holidays, Interesting facts, Sport results, Media, gardening and health as well looking ahead at “democratic evolution” and looking back at "how history was made".

This week's edition is very short. In fact I almost didn't write one, and like the "house arrest" edition that never transpired, the Judas edition almost escaped the open publishing network.

But you're not getting off that easily.
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Our twin fire ceremony for Beltine is on Sunday 30th of April on tara at 8 in the evening. This is open to all and free of charge. We will light two fires and we will walk between these two ritual fires of purification as is the ancient Gaelic custom for the start of summer. read full story / add a comment

The creation of a Critical infrastructure body charged with fast-track planning applications was held up by Michael Mc Dowell TD and Minister for Justice for many months.
The idea vaunted by Martin Cullen TD at Environment had the breaks put on due to the nimby Mc Dowell who definitely did not want Poolbeg in his back yard, interfering with his constituencey majority.
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This monday 10th April @ 7.30 in the Venue, NUIM

The venue is beside the students union building on the north campus.
Contact us if you are thinking of travelling out and need directions

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The NRA conference entitled : Building a Better Road Environment (30/03/06) was addressed by Margaret Gowen of
Gowen and co. Archaeological Consultants and project managers. The methodology of preparing an EIS used by the project management team in the M3 Route selection procedure was adapted as a template for procedural applications and re-hashed for the NRA conference. One could derive from this that it is considered a sucessful model for future road projects. read full story / add a comment

"This matter is not closed. I will persist until Sinn Féin staff, those who have become instrumental in the movement toward peace and the implementation of the Good Friday Accords, are removed as well," Higgins said. read full story / add a comment

It is being organised by the people who did the work to put on the 1st and 2nd Irish Social Forums in 2003 and 2004 and it’s called the Dublin Social Forum (DSF). If you’re into saving the environment, establishing gender equality, getting the debt dropped, facing down racism, dismantling/smashing capitalism, rebuilding our communities, ending war ... then I think you should come. In other words for those who oppose the violent racist sexist war-waging community-destroying public-service-selling ecocide of a neoliberalist capitalist system and its processes of globalisation, there must be some way that we can meet each other publicly, and this forum is one way to meet.

[Scroll to the end for this months DSF title, venue, details, egroup, etc.]

WHY SHOULD ONE GO?

I firmly believe that politically and environmentally there is too much at stake for us not to engage each other, I firmly believe that one way to do this is through active participation in an open political forum and that in this forum we can create an atmosphere where we can learn what opposing neoliberalism means to others like us but not necessarily the same as us, in this forum we can learn from each other so as to better understand the world around us, and to build trust and action to co-ordinate and strengthen our various struggles for the betterment of all.

Part of the demand for such a monthly antineoliberalist forum springs from the observation that sectors of the antineoliberalist movements, be they trade union, development, hard-left, environmentalist, libertarian, gender, human rights, community, etc, tend to meet just themselves at their own meetings, protests and conferences, and that one of the things we need collectively, is a challenging open space, a forum to learn from each other, to try to convince each other to support each others perspectives and campaigns, to build alliances for specific campaigns and issues, and to perhaps learn to work together better for the collective benefit of all our struggles ... or indeed to clarify the issues on which we disagree. read full story / add a comment

The myth of the five roads to tara comes alive and is found to be the truth and a treasure is returned to the Celtic World. The centre of tara is found in the triangle where these five roads meet. The attached image shows the five ancient roads to tara in red. The line of red dots on the photograph shows where there used to be a road to the east coast. This road to the east coast is clearly shown on the 1830's map inset in the circle - the map has been turned to align with the photo - see http://www.druidschool.com/site/1030100/page/809109 read full story / add a comment

NRA are conferencing at Croker on Thursday 30/03/06.

The Title of the conference is:

BUILDING A BETTER ROAD ENVIRONMENT.

Minister Roche will address. The crony lobby will attend.

We think its time to bring some banners out there. Letters also.
Demanding an audit of the NRA, asking for the instigation of a
statutory body to implement our heritage legislation and intelligent investment in our heritage.

Call me @ 087 7765289., if you are interested in standing outside and protesting. The conference is listed and well publicised. There are links on the event calendar.
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A small group of dedicated volunteers descended on Drimnagh Castle early on Friday morning in order to ready the building for that evenings benefit banquet. read full story / add a comment

The Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland held a one day event on Thursday 9^th March entitled ‘ tara Seminar’ in the Helen Roe Theatre. This was partly to celebrate the publication of the latest book on tara, edited by Edel Bhreathnach, called ‘The Kingship and Landscape of tara’. read full story / add a comment

The PDs' announcement of a plan to move Dublin Port comes at an interesting time, when the Dublin Port Tunnel (an integral part of the expansion plan implemented by the Dublin Port Authority) is nearing completion. This article reveals that the idea to relocate the Port is not an original creation of the PDs': in fact it goes back to 1990. But why, in spite of a set of logical reasons in favour of the move, was the plan put on the back burner in favour of the construction of the multi-million Port Tunnel and minor upgrades to the port facilities? read full story / add a comment