Mayor reveals reasons he chose to axe new Christmas market in Limerick city

MAYOR John Moran has confirmed there will be no market taking place beside the Daniel O'Connell monument this Christmas.

It comes despite a proposed road closure being advertised last week by council. If it was given the go-ahead it would have paved the way for the attraction at The Crescent this festive season.

The proposal outlined that one section of O'Connell Street would have been closed from December 1 to December 24, inbound to the city. 

Under the notice, the outbound section of O’Connell Street in this area towards Raheen and Dooradoyle was projected to close each weekend from Saturday, December 6, to Sunday, December 21.

But speaking to Limerick Live at University Hospital Limerick this Monday morning, Mayor Moran said: "The proposals were developed late and they came late. I wasn't happy it was going to be a success. It's public money, so we decided we would push it off until next year."

"What I would love to do is to start planning the market for nexr year, next week. You need to get ahead of these things, and that's part of what I think we need to improve," said the mayor.

He said he actually made the decision in relation to calling off this year's market a fortnight ago.

When asked why a notice was published advising of proposed road closures last week, he said the question would need to be directed to the director general of the council, Dr Pat Daly.

Mayor Moran delegated responsibility for the lion's share of the Christmas programme in Limerick to Dr Daly two weeks ago.

However, this did not include the Christmas market, which Limerick Live understands, was to be funded from the executive mayor's own allocation.

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The Limerick City Centre Traders Association on Friday called for the relocation of any planned Christmas market off O'Connell Street and into Barrington Street and Pery Square.

They had held an emergency meeting after the publication of the council's proposed road closure notice, in the belief the market was going ahead in December.

Speaking on their calls, Mayor Moran said: "Some of what we had considered is we would have had a Christmas that would have extended from King John's Castle to The Crescent. That requires activiation, decoration all the way up O'Connell Street, to use the street which we have spent so much money on. We could put it in Pery Square, John's Square. But out of the choices that seemed to make sense, we thought this was the best one."

After it emerged Mayor Moran was handing over responsibility for Christmas to Dr Daly, Fine Gael's metropolitan councillors issued a strongly worded statement accusing him of an "abdication of duty" among other things.

Responding to this, the first citizen said: "We had a situation where people wanted to scapegoat someone before looking at the facts. Nobody had asked me for the facts. I spoke from Rotterdam to the councillors about why I was making the decisions I made. I think they understand the situation, yet they issue a press release immediately afterwards."

"Everyone wants Limerick to do more, to do better. Here we have a situation where we could have done more. We could have done it different. If we all pull together I think we can, but it will be for 2026. Right now for me, the most important thing is those people who can try and help - the kids in Limerick deserve to have the best Christmas they can have, and let's just drive on and leave the political noise aside," he urged.

Mayor Moran claimed there had been agreement with councillors to deliver a certain number of items for Christmas.

"I told them, drive on with it: there is budget allocated to it, and make sure it's delivered well for Christmas. If we find other stuff to do along the way and it makes sense without disrupting that, come and talk to me," he said.

But this, he argued, did not happen.

Asked if he would be kept abreast of what is planned for Limerick's Christmas programme, he added: "I don't need to be. I'm involved in hundreds of things. The idea of the delegation is Pat would come with the exact plan of what they are going to deliver as discussed with councillors, and he just delivers that. I prefer to do housing and other stuff if I have to. It's a team effort and we need everybody doing their bit."

Limerick City and County Council did not return a request for comment.