Gateway Apartments near DCU

Finch* · 02-07-2007 7:19pm #1

any opinions on them? i can't find any info, google doesn't help and it's not listed in the sticky above

i'm on the waiting list for shanowen hall but i'd rather not take the chance

anyone stayed there before?

cheers

Alanthroneus · 04-07-2007 7:39pm

i wasnt there.but afaik there is 5 rooms or so with one bathroom. ther was some news reports of people getting stabbed and waking up to a knife at their face but i hear its quite cheap....

Finch* · 05-07-2007 6:44pm

ehh, what's this about stabbings??

Alanthroneus · 05-07-2007 8:02pm

http://www.thecollegeview.com/ november 14th has an article on it .

gizmo · 06-07-2007 2:18pm

I've heard nothing but horror stories about the place to be honest, I'd give it a miss if I were you.

StupidLikeAFox · 11-07-2007 9:45pm

had a friend live there two years ago, had a savage time of it, landlord/caretaker or whatever was good craic and they had leather couches/ntl, loads of cool ****. would have prob got a place there if i hadnt moved onwards and upwards

mental07 · 12-07-2007 11:10am

The apartments themselves are really nice, the location is a little iffy though...having said that I never had any trouble personally.

ghostdancer · 14-07-2007 8:23pm

lived there from sept-june this year.
3 seperate bedrooms, 1 bathroom, kitchen, living area. washing machine/drier, microwave, oven/grill/4-ring hob, tv+dvd player w/ 17 channel NTL, kitchen has table+4 chairs, living area has a 3seater leather couch, and a 2 seater leather couch.
having been in the Res and Shanowen apts., i much prefer the Gateway ones.
we had 3 checks on the apartment per year, but we were never actually there when they did, and just left a note saying they'd be back on a certain day about 2 weeks later, but only 1 of the 3 times did they come back to check, and as long as nothing major was amiss with the apartment, they didn't mind.
the management don't really have any interaction with you unless to want them to, so it's not even as if they treat you like adults, as they're not treating you like anything. far better than all the rules and regulations and checks that the other 2 have.

basically it's cheap because of the location, as Ballymun Regeneration group gets big tax breaks for the all the new buildings going up around the place, but it's right on the edge of ballymun and there's no reason to be going into the heart of ballymun at all. there's a supervalu supermarket (with off-licence) and pharmacy across the road, and a tesco beside that, so that was all the shopping needs taken care of. bus stop 30seconds walk away (4/13/17), chipper right across the road too.
taxi from town costs between 10-15, would drop you right at the door.
no problem having people stay over or having parties (assuming the parties are quietening down early enough, i'm sure 50 people still partying at 4am might get told to keep the noise down).

it's on the DCU side of ballymun, took about 10mins walk, either along the main ballymun road, or cutting through the santry estates, up by shanowen, and past the helix.

safety wise, it's fairly grand. the only incidents i've heard of are that stabbing which was on the the road beside the apartments, and apparently one of the ground floor apartments was broken into around march or so i think.
considering i've heard of robberies in shanowen and on res, and plenty of alleged assaults around the dcu enterances, it's fairly grand.

to get into the complex you need a fob scanner thing which opens the main gate to let you in (main gate is located right on the main road), then scan it again to open the door as you're going into your apartment block (think there was 8 of them, although they're all 1 continuous semi-circle shaped building, there's different doors depending on where within the complex you are), then there's 4 apartments per floor, with key access to each, and finally seperate key access to your bedroom).

from around november or so last year they had a security guard there, but that only seemed to be because students would come back in the middle of the night pissed, and be shouting or singing outside and waking up people. of the few different security guards, i never had any run-ins with them.

there's plenty of scumbags in the general area, i'm not gonna lie to you, but i never ever had any dealings with any of them, and they never bothered me, and i'm hardly the most intimidating of people.
i'm sure if i bothered venturing further into ballymun it may have been worse, but i never had any reason to do so, as Supervalu across the road took care of all shopping related needs.
as i said before, it's on the DCU side of ballymun, so basically the apartments are the first thing you encounter as you walk in, so it's grand. if they were shifted the same distance the far side of DCU, they'd be pretty much the perfect accomodation, student or not.

so in short, they're fine. cheaper and nicer than Shanowen and Res, in a slightly dodgy area, but i've never had any trouble myself, and don't know of anyone else who had any problems. i was fairly apprehensive at first when i heard the word "Ballymun", but it's fine to be honest, there's loads of new buildings going up around the place, and there's a big Dublin Corporation office building right beside the apartments themselves. if you have a chance, wander out there some afternoon and have a quick look around, if you get the 13/13A/4 from town, it's the 4th stop after you get off for DCU, or if on the Collins Ave. side of dcu, walk up past the helix, take a right at the main road crossroads, and it's about 5mins walk up there. can't miss them, first thing you encounter as you get to Ballymun.....