Dundrum Town Centre Carpark

TeaServer

Not sure where to put this thread, but its somewhat relevant here I think. Mods feel free to move it as necessary.

I moved house over the weekend and needed to pickup a few things on Sunday afternoon for the new place, so I decided to go to Dundrum SC as its pretty close and had all I needed, namely Tesco and Argos.

There was a pretty bad queue of cars to enter the carpark but the electronic signs assured me that there was free spaces in the red and green carparks so I continued to queue patiently. After eventually getting to the barriers to get a ticket about 15 mins in traffic, I was happy to see the electronic signs telling me there were free spaces immediately to my left. I turned left and there was a queue of cars, all heading to the same space(s). However, as the parking jobs on either side of the 'free' space was so brutal, there is not enough room for a pushchair, not to mention a car.

I carried on and to my complete amusment the chaos did not end there. Over the next 30 minutes, yes it took 30 mins to find one of the many 'free' spaces, I saw a girl in her new mini cooper try to squezze into one of these dodgy free spaces only to completely smash into a support column, a guy giving out to me after I did a 3 point turn, telling me I was going to wrong way only to realise what I had realised too late, it was a dead end and you have to turn around to get out! Moments later 3 more cars follow him (presumably to have to do the same and do a U-turn). I tried warning many more drivers about this, but they continued to follow the arrows showing the tiny free spaces and then continue to the dead end. And then there were the abandoned cars, anywhere a car could fit it was left there. Madness!

Has anyone experienced this? I've never been in a carpark like it, it is without a doubt the most inefficent system I've ever come across, mainly because there are some many cars in there hunting for whatever space was promised outside. I don't expect much sympathy here, as I was the fool who waited almost 3/4 of an hour for a space, rest assured I'll never visit the place again by car!

havana

Guess you learned the hard way what anyone who lives around there knows. Walk:-)

out of interest which entrance did you use?

L1011

...and you have to pay for the parking, don't you?

Paying to shop, possibly an 'only in Ireland' thing.

copacetic

MYOB wrote: »

...and you have to pay for the parking, don't you?

Paying to shop, possibly an 'only in Ireland' thing.

ever been in any other big city in the world?
Try london, you have to pay to enter the city and then pay
a fortune to park also.

Charging for parking was part of the planning permission for Dundrum.

su_dios

Theres plenty of floors in the main carpark and I've parked there on Saturdays and Sundays and never much of a problem! Which carpark?

PS they do a great rate for parking on Sundays. Thinks its 3 hours for price of 1?

joeperry

TeaServer wrote: »

I moved house over the weekend and needed to pickup a few things on Sunday afternoon for the new place, so I decided to go to Dundrum SC

I never go anywhere near civilisation in a car on a Sat or Sun afternoon,especially on the run in to chrimbo........it's as bad as a mid-week rush hour .................before 12pm on a Sat and 2pm on a Sun is your best bet for car travel.

Lumen

Under no circumstances go to a Dublin shopping centre in November or December.

If you absolutely must do so, do not do it on a weekend afternoon.

I was in the green Dundrum car park at 09:00 on Saturday morning, and had a huge choices of spaces. Not sure there were many shops open at that time though.

On Sunday afternoon, it took half an hour to get from Clonsilla to the M50, and that was using all available detours to avoid Blanch Centre traffic.

Santa doesn't use a flying sleigh for nothing.

GreeBo

I think I got stuck in that same dead end, in the green car park I believe.

Fair play to you if you did a 3 point turn to get out, I think I had to do 4 or 5 (Avensis)
But having it one lane only is just silly.

I usually dont have any problem parking in here though and €2 for 3 hours is pretty darn good.

havana

I think they charge to ensure people dont park there for the day and get the luas into town.

Anytime i have been in the carpark there has been plenty of spaces. The problem often is that most people head straight for the spaces closest to the centre. Those further away are often empty. And most people also seem to use the tesco or sandyford road entrances whereas the entrance on the other side of the centre is often much quieter

The Real B-man

Bottom level is always empty in the Red Carpark :pac:

L1011

copacetic wrote: »

ever been in any other big city in the world?
Try london, you have to pay to enter the city and then pay
a fortune to park also.

Charging for parking was part of the planning permission for Dundrum.

Yes, plenty of them.

Dundrum is an out-of-town (just about) centre. You don't pay for parking in any other of these I've ever been in.

Dundrum would also not likely be in a charge zone so I fail to see how the comparison to the London one is valid?

bikki

This is why i always park in the old Tesco's car park. Its only 2 min walk away.

TeaServer

havana wrote:

out of interest which entrance did you use?

It was the Sandyford Rd entrance coming from the village side

su_dios wrote:

PS they do a great rate for parking on Sundays. Thinks its 3 hours for price of 1?

Yep 3 hours for 2 euro, mind you I spend most of an hour just trying to park . It's free between 11pm and 6am I believe - should be easy to get a space then I reckon

I'll certainly walk in future, I had to do a full grocery shop and I was picking up a chest of drawers from Argos. I won't be doing it again..

NinjaTruncs

if you're going grocery shopping you're better off going to Nutgrove, as getting into Dundrum is a nightmare and will only get worse as we get closer to christmas.

I was down in dundrum on saturday and getting into the car park was a awful. Cars were holding people up as they tried to reverse into spots and they we're uncapable of reversing. On person i saw on my way out lined up so badly it was as if they were trying to get into the spot beside the one they were going for. As i was leaving i could hear the horns of the all the cars behind that fool going off.

rabbitinlights

You could park near a Luas station and get the Luas to Dundrum.

Seth Brundle

I was at a work do last year and parked there.
When I went back to get the car the centre had largely closed as had most of the car park.
Myself and a colleague spent a joyous 20 mintues or so tearing around the empty cap park (with its painted floors) looking for the exit. Unfortunately we found it but we did leave some nice artwork on the floor!