Boardwalk problems

I got a call on Friday to do an RTE news piece about the problems on the Liffey Boardwalk. There have been dozens of people arrested in the last number of weeks because of anti-social behaviour. Unfortunately when you have large problems of addiction, homelessness and mental illness in society, public spaces and amenities attract these problems. The answer is not just policing because policing just moves the problems from one place to another. Many employees in Civic Offices and in Liberty Hall complain about the level of anti-social behaviour outside their workplaces and indeed venders on the boardwalk are complaining too.
Certainly policing will help and has been seen to work over the last number of weeks with plenty of arrests. However we need to have a more thorough investigation into why we have so many of these problems in Irish society today. Day Care Centres for the homeless will help but we obviously have major difficulties that we are not facing up to.
Residents in Tolka Road are terrified at the prospect of a boardwalk being built at the rear of their houses overlooking the Tolka River. The City Council are the only ones who seem to want this boardwalk as it was part of the planning conditions given to the developer on the Richmond Road who is constructing apartment blocks. The residents dont want it, the developer doesnt want to build it - so why is it going up?