Portrane Irish: Port Reachrann | |
---|---|
Village | |
Coordinates: 53°29′36″N6°06′53″W / 53.4934°N 6.1146°W | |
Country | Ireland |
Province | Leinster |
County | County Dublin |
Local government area | Fingal |
Government | |
• Dáil constituency | Dublin Fingal |
• EP constituency | Dublin |
Population (2022) | |
• Total | 1,262 |
Time zone | UTC+0 (WET) |
• Summer (DST) | UTC-1 (IST (WEST)) |
Irish Grid Reference | O254510 |
Portrane or Portraine (Irish : Port Reachrann) is a small seaside village located three kilometers from the town of Donabate in Fingal, County Dublin in Ireland. It is in the barony of Nethercross in the north of the county. [1]
Portrane has an approximately 2 km (1.2 mi) long sandy beach backed by sand dunes in places on the north end. There is a small carpark and access to the beach is restricted to pedestrians. At the very north end of the beach is a National Heritage Area which is visited by various migratory birds during winter time. [2]
There are several notable historic buildings in Portrane including a 19th-century martello tower. Other notable examples include;
Portrane's most prominent feature is Tower Bay, and Portrane asylum, more commonly known as St. Ita's Hospital. Built in the early 1900s, the asylum is made up of a number of Victorian red brick buildings which dominate the peninsula. Features within the main asylum building include two churches and an imposing clock tower. The building operated as a mental hospital for many years with it finally closing to inpatients in 2011 and outpatients in 2014 before being refurbished and repurposed as a modern mental health facility. Following the sale of the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum in 2012 it was announced that it would relocate to the updated St.Ita's facility in Portrane. [3] [4] [5]
In the hospital grounds is a monument to George Hampden Evans, a replica of an Irish Round Tower.
Portrane Castle (sometimes called Stella's Tower) is a 3-storey late medieval castellated tower house adjacent to St. Catherine's housing estate. Jonathan Swift's 'Stella', Esther Johnson is said to have stayed there and given the castle its unusual nickname. The inquisition of 1541 mentions the castle as being a substantial structure with associated outbuildings including a threshing house and hemp yard while the Civil Survey of 1655 describes this site as an old castle with a thatched hall adjoining owned by the parsonage of Portrane. A later brick chimney can also be seen at the top of the tower. [6] [7] Samuel Lewis describes the castle as long since deserted in his Topographical Dictionary of Ireland in 1837 and notes the last occupant was Lady Acheson. [8]
Today the castle sits in a field of privately owned tillage land.
The Church in Portrane was granted to the Convent of Grace Dieu in the 12th century. Originally called St. Canice's, a new church was built in the 14th century and renamed St. Catherine's. St. Catherine's was coupled with St. Patrick's, Donabate, with the Vicar of Donabate serving in Portrane, with the decline of St. Catherine's the parish was linked to Donabate in the 17th century, and only eventually merged in 1835. Many of the Evans family from Portrane Castle are buried in the graveyard.
The coast in this area is subject to erosion, and since the 1980s, 100 acres (40 ha) of beach at Portrane has been lost. Many houses on the peninsula were demolished in the 1960s due to the dangers of erosion. A storm in March 2018 caused erosion of low cliffs backing the beach, and one home was destroyed. Concrete structures known as sea bees have been placed below the cliffs, but the erosion continues and further houses are threatened. [9]
Members of the band U2 owned a caravan in a field in Portrane where they composed some of the music and lyrics for their 1981 album, October . [10] Lead singer Bono was baptized at Portrane beach by the Shalom religious group which all but Adam Clayton were a member of. [11] [12] Rock band the Delorentos are Portrane natives. [13]
Portrane has been used as a location for a number of film and television shoots. Parts of the Channel 4 television series Father Ted were filmed in Portrane, most notably Funland in the first episode "Good Luck, Father Ted" was filmed in Tower Bay. It also featured in the BBC series "Murphy's Law" starring James Nesbitt. [11]
Irish round towers are early medieval stone towers of a type found mainly in Ireland, with two in Scotland and one on the Isle of Man. As their name Cloigtheach indicates, they were originally bell towers, though they may have been later used for additional purposes.
Swords in County Dublin, the county town of the local government area of Fingal, is a large suburban town on the east coast of Ireland, situated ten kilometres north of Dublin city centre. It is the eighth largest urban area in Ireland, with a population of 40,776 as of the 2022 census. The town was reputedly founded c. AD 560. Located on the Ward River, Swords features Swords Castle, a restored medieval castle, a holy well from which it takes its name, a round tower and a Norman tower. Facilities in the area include the Pavilions shopping centre, one of the largest in the Dublin region, a range of civic offices, some light industries, the main storage facility and archive of the National Museum of Ireland and several parks. Dublin Airport is located nearby.
Donabate is an outer suburb of Dublin, Ireland, about 21 kilometres north-northeast of Dublin, within the local government area of Fingal. The town is on a peninsula on Ireland's east coast, between the Rogerstown Estuary to the north and Broadmeadow Estuary to the south. Donabate is a civil parish in the ancient barony of Nethercross.
St. Ita's Hospital is a mental health facility in Portrane in the north of County Dublin in Ireland.
George Coppinger Ashlin was an Irish architect, particularly noted for his work on churches and cathedrals, and who became President of the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland.
The United Dioceses of Dublin and Glendalough is a diocese of the Church of Ireland in the east of Ireland. It is headed by the Archbishop of Dublin, who is also styled the Primate of Ireland. The diocesan cathedral is Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin.
St Conal's Hospital was a psychiatric hospital located in Letterkenny, County Donegal, Ireland. Opened in 1866, it had people work on its farm as recently as 1995. The building is still extant.
The Rt.Hon. George Hampden Evans was an Irish politician.
Newbridge Demesne is an early 18th-century Georgian estate and mansion situated in north County Dublin, Ireland. It was built from around 1751 by Charles Cobbe, Archbishop of Dublin, and remained the property of his Cobbe descendants until 1985. It was then acquired by Dublin County Council, in an arrangement, under which Newbridge House would remain the family home.
St. Brendan's Hospital was a psychiatric facility located in the north Dublin suburb of Grangegorman. It formed part of the mental health services of Dublin North East with its catchment area being North West Dublin. It is now the site of a modern mental health facility known as the "Phoenix Care Centre". Since the official opening of the Richmond Lunatic Asylum in 1815 the Grangegorman site has continuously provided institutional facilities for the reception of the mentally ill until the present day. As such the Phoenix Care Centre represents the continuation of the oldest public psychiatric facility in Ireland.
St. Dympna's Hospital is a psychiatric hospital located in Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland.
Nethercross is a feudal title of one of the baronies of Ireland. Originally part of the Lordship of Meath, it was then constituted as part of the County Dublin. Today, is in the modern county of Fingal.
The Central Mental Hospital is a mental health facility housing forensic patients in Portrane, Dublin, Ireland. The hospital, along with a community day centre for outpatients at Usher's Island, forms part of the National Forensic Mental Health Service.
Eleonora Lilian Fleury (1867–1960) sometimes known as Norah Fleury was the first woman to graduate in medicine from the Royal University of Ireland (1890). She was also the first woman member of the Medico Psychological Association, elected in 1894. After graduating medical school, she worked at the Homerton Fever Hospital in London for a year, and then worked at the Richmond Asylum in Ireland for 27 years, eventually becoming deputy medical director there. From 1921 until 1926 she worked at Portrane Asylum in Donabate, and then she retired. She was arrested in 1921 by Irish state forces for being involved in an assistance and escape program for anti-treaty prisoners which was centred on the asylum at Portrane. After she was released she returned to her work at the asylum.
St. Loman's Hospital was a psychiatric hospital located in Mullingar, Westmeath in the Midlands of Ireland. The hospital closed on 5 December 2013 following the relocation of St Edna's Ward, which was the only remaining ward in the original Gothic building, to a new building on campus.
Tellarought Castle is a fortified tower house located approximately 10.8 km south-east of New Ross, County Wexford, Ireland.
Glenside Hospital, as it was known from 1967, previously the Public Colonial Lunatic Asylum of South Australia, Parkside Lunatic Asylum and Parkside Mental Hospital, was a complex of buildings used as a psychiatric hospital in Glenside, South Australia.
St Patrick's University Hospital is a teaching hospital at Kilmainham in Dublin. The building, which is bounded by Steeven's Lane to the east, and Bow Lane West to the south, is managed by St Patrick’s Mental Health Services.
The Londonderry County Asylum was a psychiatric hospital at Strand Road in Derry, County Londonderry, Northern Ireland.
Sutton Castle or Sutton House is a Victorian Tudor-style castellated mansion house with terraced gardens on the southern coast of Howth Head, overlooking Dublin Bay, in the suburbs of Dublin, Ireland.