Sensing regeneration in a working-class Dublin suburb

This article focuses on the regeneration of Ballymun, a working-class Dublin suburb built in the 1960s as a utopian high-rise estate for social housing tenants. However, following the estate’s rapid deterioration both economically and socially, the suburb underwent a process of regeneration at the turn of the millennium, which saw the complete demolition of the high-rise buildings and the rebuilding of the estate as a low-rise area. The article explores how the neoliberalisation of the Irish welfare state, as reflected in the spatial transformation of Ballymun, is intimately experienced by the residents through their senses, particularly through thermal perception. The shift from a collective, state-provided heating system to an individualised, responsibility-based model reflects a broader neoliberal policy and has profoundly affected the residents’ sense of belonging and sense of place. It is argued that the changes in the sensory perception of warmth in residents’ homes before and after regeneration have contributed to their sense of symbolic displacement: through the changes in sensory experience, the article argues, residents experience ruptures in their sense of place, home and community.