Appraising infrastructure for new towns in Ireland

Copyright © 2013 ICE Publishing Ltd. Permission is granted by ICE Publishing to print one copy for personal use. Any other use of these PDF files is subject to reprint fees.Over a 20 year period 1996–2016, a new 223 ha town is being developed 10 miles west of Dublin's city centre on the south side of Lucan, County Dublin, in the Republic of Ireland (ROI). This €4 billion ‘Adamstown’ development is the first of four planning schemes in ROI to be approved as a strategic development zone – an integrated planning framework deemed suitable for creating sustainable neighbourhoods in sites of strategic economic or social importance to the state. The creation of sustainable neighbourhoods in ROI is facilitated through the implementation of a checklist of 60 indicators. This paper critically examines the attempts being made to consider sustainability within the development's overall infrastructure plan, specifically: transport, energy and water services, information technology and waste. Inadequacies in the existing development are linked to shortfalls in the sustainability checklist, by way of a comparison of infrastructure-related indicators from the ROI checklist with those derived for the UK and exemplar European projects (i.e. Bedzed, UK and Freiberg, Germany). The subsequent legacy for future residents of Adamstown is then considered in the context of ‘what if’ scenarios

Ethical Issues in Internet Research: International Good Practice and Irish Research Ethics Documents

This chapter discusses the main research ethical concerns that arise in internet research and reviews existing research ethical guidance in the Irish context in relation to its application to internet research. The chapter begins with a brief outline of high profile cases in the early history of the internet that highlighted specific emerging ethical concerns regarding the new medium and the first development of ethical guidance in this context. Important research ethical concerns in internet research are then presented. These include: (i) understanding the specific relationship between researchers, participants and the online materials, and the ethical significance of contributors\u27 potential lack of awareness of research conducted on their online interactions, (ii) clarifying privacy expectations and ethical requirements regarding the access to and use of online materials, (iii) implementing ethically appropriate consent processes in the online medium, (iv) doing justice to confidentiality, anonymity and data protection requirements and (v) clarifying vulnerability of participants, and potential risks and benefits arising from research participation. In the final part of the chapter existing Irish research ethical guidance documents are reviewed in relation to the relevance of their guidance for the conduct of internet research.Not peer reviewe