At about 45 m across, O’Connell Street is the widest street in Dublin and among the broadest in Ireland, which is why the St Patrick’s Day parade – the country’s largest – runs down it every 17 March. It stretches roughly 600 m north from O’Connell Bridge over the River Liffey up to Parnell Street and Parnell Square, carrying buses, pedestrians and the Luas Red Line, which stops at O’Connell GPO and O’Connell Upper. Henry Street cuts it in two, splitting the commercial lower half near the river from the more mixed-use upper end.
History
This was a narrow 17th-century lane called Drogheda Street before the Wide Streets Commission widened it in the late 1700s and renamed it Sackville Street after the Duke of Dorset. In the 18th century Luke Gardiner laid out a tree-lined granite-walled promenade, ‘Gardiner’s Mall’, down the middle – the ancestor of the central median you still walk today. The street took its present name in 1924, after the nationalist leader Daniel O’Connell, whose bronze monument by John Henry Foley faces the bridge at the southern end.
Most of the country’s 20th-century history passed through here: the 1913 Lock-out, the 1916 Easter Rising centred on the GPO, the Civil War battles of 1922, and the IRA bombing of Nelson’s Pillar in 1966. After the 1916 fighting flattened much of the street, a single coordinated reconstruction gave it the early-20th-century frontage it has now. It is a protected Architectural Conservation Area.
What to see
The General Post Office is the one to prioritise. Its 1818 portico took the brunt of the 1916 bombardment and survived, and the ticketed GPO Museum inside covers the Rising and its aftermath in detail (see its own page for hours and admission).
Outside, the street doubles as a sculpture gallery. The 120 m stainless-steel Spire went up in 2003 on the site of Nelson’s Pillar. The 1883 O’Connell Monument anchors the south end. Further up are the James Larkin statue (1980, on a Wicklow granite plinth), the marble Parnell Monument near the northern junction, the William Smith O’Brien and Sir John Gray statues both by Thomas Farrell, and the Theobald Mathew statue mid-street. Shopping is mostly high-street: Primark fills a large unit on the north side, the old Clerys department store building (1822) has reopened as the mixed-use Clerys Quarter, and the Ilac Centre sits just off the street. The Gresham Hotel has traded here since 1817. For all the history, the street today is more thoroughfare than destination: the shops are standard high-street names and the real pull is the GPO, the monuments down the median and the galleries a few minutes north, not the retail.
Nearby
Most of the worthwhile detours are a few minutes north, around Parnell Square: the Dublin Writers Museum, the Garden of Remembrance, the Hugh Lane Gallery with Francis Bacon’s reconstructed studio, and the neo-classical St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral. The National Leprechaun Museum, just off Parnell Street, takes Irish folklore as its subject if that appeals. The Abbey Theatre is a short walk east, and Henry Street is the city’s busiest pedestrian shopping run.
Practical information
The street is free and open around the clock. Dublin Bus routes and the Luas Red Line serve it directly; the nearest DART stations are Tara Street and Connolly, both a short walk. On-street parking is scarce – the Q-Park on O’Connell Street and the council car park on Abbey Street are the closest options. As a conservation area the footpaths have been widened and resurfaced, and the Luas trams are low-floor, so access is reasonable. Public toilets are at the GPO and several Luas stops. The Dublin Tourist Information Centre on the street gives out free maps and Fáilte Ireland advice, open daily 9am–6pm.