The Ballymun Flats were built in the 1960s to accommodate the rising population. However the flats had a major disadvantage in that there were no services such as hospitals or schools or transport facilities were the residents could travel. This in turn meant that the area had many social problems such as drugs with rampant crime as well as many other problems. During the 1990s many improvements were made but it was too little too late. The Ballymun Flats tower block complex in Ballymun, Dublin, Ireland, is scheduled for demolition. The regeneration of the area will transform not only Dublin's Northside skyline, but also the whole of Dublin from the airport to the city centre.

The seven landmark towers were named for the leaders of the Easter 1916 rising as follows:

• Pearse (demolished July 2004)
• MacDonagh
• Clarke
• Connolly
• Ceannt
• Plunkett
• MacDermott (demolished March 2005)

and the five remaining towers are clearly visible from the adjacent Dublin airport.

It's thought that the line "I see seven towers, but I only see one way out" from U2's song "Running to Stand Still" (on "The Joshua Tree" album) refer to these towers.

Unbelievably, the red aircraft-warning beacon lights on these structures were not connected to any form of back-up power for many years, leaving the towers completely dark in a power outage.

See also

• Local Authority Accommodation
• Pruitt-Igoe

External link

• New Ballymun dot com
• Ballymun Regeneration Ltd