The Irish Times

Twelve public spaces in Irish cities and towns are included in 'The Good Place Guide' to urban design in Britain and Ireland. Why is it, asks John Worthington, that so few of the places we build now are places we like? Until quite recently, as he says, we had lost the art of "civic design" by creating dull and uniform places compared to the almost organic character and even "buzz" of some of the older parts of our cities and towns.