ID this irish landmark?

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can anybody help me identify this peculiar landmark i saw in ireland long long ago? it's probably a well known thing, but i don't exactly know how to go about looking up "big ring of spires in some city in ireland" on the internet, and i haven't seen it on any pictoral lists of irish landmarks. it does, however, crop up in the art of one of the cranberries' albums, so here it is: http://www.zombieguide.com/discography/nnta-booklet1.jpg what is this intriguing monstrosity!?

― sublime frequency (sublime frequency), Saturday, 29 July 2006 01:54 (nineteen years ago)

that's a gasworks not a big ring of spires.

― jed_ (jed), Saturday, 29 July 2006 01:56 (nineteen years ago)

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&client=safari&rls=en&sa=N&resnum=0&q=dublin%20gasworks&spell=1&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&tab=wi

― jed_ (jed), Saturday, 29 July 2006 01:58 (nineteen years ago)

ah thanks!
though clearly, the terms 'gasworks' and 'big ring of spires' are not mutually exclusive.

― sublime frequency (sublime frequency), Saturday, 29 July 2006 02:04 (nineteen years ago)

gasometer

― RJG (RJG), Saturday, 29 July 2006 02:22 (nineteen years ago)

It's apartments now, in the part of Dublin known as Googleland, because it's near the new Google offices. It's one of those Dublin landmarks whose demise has been much lamented as an example of the encroachment of the 'city' on our 'town', except that they fail to take into account that that was yet another area of Dublin you wouldn't have felt safe walking around in twenty years ago, and now you can.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Saturday, 29 July 2006 06:23 (nineteen years ago)

It's really nice they've turned them into apartments, though, as opposed to just demolishing them. There was an article about them in TEH IRISH TIMES a while ago. Apparently the residents have their own little mini-ILX (or rather, a mini Bowlie Forum, given the software it uses).

― DV (dirtyvicar), Saturday, 29 July 2006 11:02 (nineteen years ago)

There's a similar one right next to where I live.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Saturday, 29 July 2006 14:22 (nineteen years ago)

http://albumit.lasipalatsi.fi/images/v/1033974-1192.jpg

It looks small in here, but it's actually quite big. It took me 26 years to figure out what it is.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Saturday, 29 July 2006 14:24 (nineteen years ago)

There's one down the road from me in Kings Cross as well, which I believe is now a listed building.

― chap who would dare to start Raaatpackin (chap), Saturday, 29 July 2006 14:25 (nineteen years ago)

Someone once told me why it's built like that, but I've forgotten the explanation. Maybe one of you smart people on ILE could shed some light on that.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Saturday, 29 July 2006 14:26 (nineteen years ago)

There used to be a bag of gas inside the ring that rose and fell according to how full it was. Something like that, anyway.

― chap who would dare to start Raaatpackin (chap), Saturday, 29 July 2006 14:32 (nineteen years ago)

I think that's the chap.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Saturday, 29 July 2006 15:06 (nineteen years ago)

they are (mostly) still in use and still rise and fall. it's not a bag though, it's a kind of concertina'd metal construction that expands and contracts. every city must have one, though not all are as ornate.

http://www.glasgowguide.co.uk/alexandra%20parade/Blochairn%20Gasworks%2001.htm

― jed_ (jed), Saturday, 29 July 2006 15:19 (nineteen years ago)

So the point of the construction is to stop the bag expanding too much?

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Saturday, 29 July 2006 15:21 (nineteen years ago)

the expandingness is to keep the gas at the right pressure, more than to store different amounts of gas

pretty much two halves, w/ gas at the top and water at the bottom. the top half is sunk into/raised out of the bottom, to vary/maintain the pressure

no bag

― RJG (RJG), Saturday, 29 July 2006 15:40 (nineteen years ago)

posted these on an architecture thread, before:

http://www.cse.polyu.edu.hk/~cecspoon/lwbt/Case_Studies/Gasometer_City/pic02_general_view.jpg

this group of four gasometers, in vienna, were converted into flats and shops and all sorts of other stuff

― RJG (RJG), Saturday, 29 July 2006 15:46 (nineteen years ago)

Wow, I've never seen them before, amazing. Vienna gasometers are clearly in a league of their own though - even before conversion.

I once had to take a series of photographs of a gasometer rising and falling because my extremely stubborn friend did not believe that that was what they did.

― Ned T.Rifle (nedtrifle), Monday, 31 July 2006 13:44 (nineteen years ago)

well done vienna!

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 31 July 2006 14:22 (nineteen years ago)

It would be great if the apartment blocks rose and fell depending on how much stuff you had in your home.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Monday, 31 July 2006 14:27 (nineteen years ago)

Or if google had bought the gasometer and had it go up and down to indicate their current share price.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Monday, 31 July 2006 20:50 (nineteen years ago)

used to be great gasometer around Kings Cross in london which was featured in the original Ladykillers film. got demolished in 1999 though.

http://fp.martinunderwood.f9.co.uk/Ladykillers/ (scroll down)

― Koogy Yonderboy (koogs), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 07:49 (nineteen years ago)

The gasometers are in storage and are going to be put back (presumably with offices/loft style luxury apartments inside them) If you walk to the corner of good's way and St pancras rd you can see the parts in storage.

― Ed (dali), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 07:52 (nineteen years ago)

That I must see/put on flickr...

― Ned T.Rifle (nedtrifle), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 08:01 (nineteen years ago)

I'll go an photgraph at lunchtime/after work

― Ed (dali), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 08:02 (nineteen years ago)

Does America have gasometers? Does America have gas mains?

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 08:40 (nineteen years ago)

yes and yes (a quick google found a company that specialises in cleaning up coal gas manufacturing sites)

― Ed (dali), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 08:43 (nineteen years ago)

http://www.hatheway.net/03_gas_plant_components.htm

http://www.hatheway.net/images/Compgraphics/swec_paducah_wg_c1925.jpg
In kentucky

― Ed (dali), Tuesday, 1 August 2006 08:44 (nineteen years ago)