Dublin gay bar to keep late-night licence after judge dismisses objection
Dublin's
best known gay bars will retain its late-night dance licences despite complaints from a resident living in an apartment above it.
Tommy Bergin claimed the noise coming from the Street 66 bar on Parliament Street was 'bonkers' and he could not sleep before 3am on Friday or Saturday night and also on Sunday nights of a bank holiday weekend. He said the bar now had a late-night licence for 130 days a year.
Dublin District Court judge Máire Conneely dismissed his objection to Street 66 bar's late-night licence.
She said the court had to take into account where the bar is located and its environs.
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It was 'not reasonable' to live in an apartment in a city centre location where there are lots of bars and late-night venues and expect that the music would be inaudible.
Mr Bergin, who moved into an apartment above the bar in 2019, made a similar application last year.
He stated that mitigation measures taken after last year's application went before the late Judge Marie Quirke had made little difference to the problem. She ordered that the premises implement a 10 decibel drop in the music levels.
Mr Bergin's barrister Conor Duff suggested that the premises was simply not suitable as a late-night venue.
Bar owner Siobhán Conmy was emotional on the stand when she told the judge that she had spent €58,000 on noise mitigation measures.
'I have always offered to do anything that people have asked. My heart is really in it,' she told the judge.
The late-night licence accounted for 30 per cent of her business and she was fearful of losing it.
Acoustics expert Diarmuid Keaney said he had fitted two noise limiters, one in the front bar and the other in the back, to comply with Judge Quirke's order, and neither had been tampered with.
Judge Conneely said the management company had said there were others within the building who complained, but none had come forward to give evidence.
There were no actual Irish or EU standards that could be referenced in relation to what constitutes a noise breach and experts were divided on the matter.
The fact that the premises had been a late-night bar for many years was a 'relevant matter that the courts must take into consideration'.
The judge found it 'strange' that Mr Bergin's complaint has been ongoing for three years, but he had not sought to engage directly with the owner about the issue.
Taking all that into account, she dismissed Mr Bergin's application.
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