If you had a choice to live 1hr from Dublin - Where would it be?

Jackie D

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Looking to move outside Dublin to a nice peaceful town or village that ticks all boxes..

• 45min-1hr from Dublin
• Safe for children growing up (new born x 1)
• Enough to do daily that you won't get bored and wish you hadn't left Dublin
• Nice settled village/town with nice people who dont really mind a Dub family landing on their doorstep ;)

Can anyone share their honest experience of moving from Dublin and do you regret moving at all? Do you miss anything? What have you gained?

Thank you
 
Is there any specific activities that you are looking for, GAA clubs, Rugby clubs, athletics clubs, theatre, drama. Do you want both primary and secondary schools available. What about Gym/swimming pool, restaurants, pubs etc.
Are you also looking for somewhere that has good public transport - bus/train - into the city centre. Nite links and the likes.
 
Wicklow somewhere. Where better to live & raise kids but in the mountains and near the sea? You also have easy access to Dublin from most of it.
 
Moved from Dublin to Ratoath over five years ago and never looked back. Dublin city centre in 40 minutes by car or regular bus. Nice friendly village with an active and at its centre.

Our second child was born just after we moved here and Mrs F joined the Mother and Baby group through which she made some good friends.

A car is necessary seeing as our public transport system presumes that everything should go through Dublin city. We have friends living in Naas who didn't drive when they moved there and it was a trek for them to come to see us, as they had to get a bus into Dublin and another one out, even though Ratoath to Naas is not that far to drive directly.

Late nights in Dublin city centre need to be well planned - last bus out is 11.30 or else you're on the Night Link. A taxi is expensive to here. But with a new-born baby, that's probably not a big issue. ;)
 
around skerries/ rush / lusk is very near dublin from commuting point of view but is still not in the city . you've got everything on your door step -good shopping in swords or drogheda but then all the kid stuff too- beaches, parks eg ardgillan castle for the playground, loads of GAA, tennis , good schools- and absolutley loads of people with your kids - which is what your after as your little one gets older.
we moved out of city centre last year cos of kids its the best thing we ever did !
 
Moved to south Wicklow 8 years today!. 3 children 2 now in local secondary school- 15min school bus away, 1 still local national school. Alot of sports, bit of a drive to pool. Several pubs, 4 restaurants with in walking distance. We did miss choice to eat out, but these days would be doing it less anyway. 45 mins to Dundrum or Carlow. Miss cinema but big new one in Arklow 15mins away. Pace of life, clean surroundings, fresh air all good, non-born with in 5 miles residents likely to be in Majority since we moved down. Downsides- heavy snow was hard to deal with, miss the Luas and Dart. Mrs Kerak misses dropping in to old friends, but they don't seem to drop in to us either! Wear and tear on cars and fuel usage is higher than in city. I might retire back to city but not for 20 years. Also miss that my 3 children are not city savvy - would get lost, have no idea of the Northside/Southside divide!.
 
Lived in Naas for a couple of years, nice town alhough I'd wonder if the new Tesco will destroy the town centre. Currently live in Carlow, 50 minutes (within the speed limit) to Newlands Cross in the morning, add 10-15 minutes in the other direction in the evening as the Naas by-pass can be a car park. Good train connections into Dublin if the weather is bad. Carlow's a good town, although bad planning has somewhat killed off the town centre and the soul of the town, good schools, new arts centre and theatre and also only 20 minutes to Kilkenny and an hour to Waterford.
 
Dunshaughlin!!
Good schools-secondary and 2 primary. Good childcare- have baby in local creche which she loves and better value than Dublin. Good mother and child group and activities for young children-piano, sax, guitar, music, dancing, drama etc. Great community spirit- couple of pubs and restaurants. Near to facilities in Blanchardstown or Navan for swimming pools, cinema etc. There is a supervalu or we do online shopping with tesco which is delivered to door. Bus Eireann to town is roughly every 40 mins during peak times or you can drive 10 mins to the M3 parkway train stop just outside of Dunboyne and get train into town.

Good points about Dunshaughlin are:
- you get much better value for money on houses than Dublin,
- petrol etc is cheaper than Dublin,
- still close to family in Dublin (mother in Swords is only 25-30 mins away), - people are very friendly and lovely community spirit,
- lots of activities still,
- traffic isnt too bad if you do need to drive into town in rush hour

Bad points
- there obviously isnt the same level of facilities as Dublin
 
Gorey and its environs. Really depends on whether you're a northsider or a southsider at heart. Loads of lovely new builds within Gorey vicinity, very affordable (I wish I had money in the bank to snap up the current bargains!). 1 hour from my house in Riverchapel to Dundrum - a good measure of distances, because all along that route, which is mainly excellent roads, there are schools, shopping centres, interesting countryside, seaside and rural living. I'd recommend it.
 
We moved to Trim, Co. Meath a couple of years ago. Great place to raise a family imo, plenty to do (Aura gym/pool, new GAA centre, plenty of clubs and activities), lovely town with nice walks etc., and really well looked after. 40 mins gets me into Phibsboro by car in the mornings.

Good choice of primary schools including a Gaelscoil and there's a couple of creches and plenty of playschools.

I reckon if you are upping sticks from Dublin and moving out a bit, moving to somewhere that has a tourist office is a good start, and take it from there. If there's a tourist office, the place obviously has something worth visiting! :)
 
Thank you for all your replies so far. Some interesting reading! Currently living in swords we would prefer to stay northside - friends, airport and sea etc.. Skerries is nice but a little windy to get in and out of. There are some beautiful little towns scattered throughout Ireland but living near water/the sea is a must for relaxing etc.. In an ideal world Malahide ticks all the boxes - away from it all, great shops, restaurants, pubs, Malahide Castle and the sea but house prices are relatively expensive there still - even for a modest home. If Killarney wasnt as far away as it is - another ideal place to live.

Please keep the suggestions coming ;)
 
Bray/Greystones (the gorgeous mountains and sunny south east are on your doorstep) or Rush/Lusk or Maynooth, anywhere really that isn't Dublin that has easy access to public transport. It may not matter now, but it will when your kids are older. They will want to get about & pursue their own interests, hobbies and relationships. They won't always be in the town that you choose. You don't want to have to be a permanent taxi driver for them. My uncle moved his family to the country when his kids were small. It was a small town half way between Dublin Airport and Naul. There were 3 buses a day to town, and 3 back. Almost no service on weekends. Growing up, his kids were always whinging about the things that they didn't get to do, especially on weekends and during school holidays coz both parents worked. If one of them wasn't around to bring them where they wanted to go, pick them up later, or drop them into Swords to get the regular service into Dublin, then they didn't get to do it. My brother and I loved going out there in the summer. We were very jealous of my cousins huge house, massive back garden and hay fields and strawberry farm next door. We didn't envy them the isolation they felt, and how boring they felt their lives were when they couldn't come and go with relative ease. Being on the DART or commuter train lines, or regular bus line would solve a lot of that.
 
It may not matter now, but it will when your kids are older. They will want to get about & pursue their own interests, hobbies and relationships.

Valid point/s Beffers. Transport is everything and a Tourist Office as someone said earlier :)
 
East Meath. Beaches, train line, M1, good schools, lots of families, full of dubs and foreigners so welcoming to all, lots nearby. I wouldn't go anywhere in-land.
 
we would prefer to stay northside .. Skerries is nice .. living near water/the sea is a must for relaxing etc.

+1 to all of that

I was out around Skerries and Loughshinny last night. Granted that the weather was lovely and the sea was exceptionally calm, but the overall area made a good impression on me.

I have never had to, and in reality it would make no real difference, but I have an aversion to the thought of living inland. Even suburbs of Dublin that are more than a mile from the shore have no appeal for me.
 
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