A wild park built on a rubbish dump
Irishtown Nature Reserve is a strip of reclaimed wilderness on the Poolbeg peninsula, beside Sandymount Strand, with the sweep of Dublin Bay in front of you. Grassland and scrub now cover the former landfill. The genuinely interesting thing about it: barely fifty years ago this was a heap of building rubble. The paths give open views across the bay, with places to watch birds from the shore.
From dump to nature reserve
During a short building boom between 1972 and 1975, construction rubble and household waste were tipped here on a grand scale. Turning that mound into a park struck most people as far-fetched, and when the Sandymount and Merrion Residents Association put the idea to the old Dublin Corporation in the mid-1970s, scepticism won the room. They persisted. Through the 1980s the Corporation and local volunteers cleared and shaped the ground, sowed grasses and planted trees, and let nature do the rest; the park was established around 1987.
There’s an odd second layer underfoot. During the early-1980s Wood Quay excavations in the city, one of the most contested archaeological digs in Irish history, lorry loads of potentially significant rubble were dumped here. None of it is on show, but the ground itself is said to hold fragments of medieval Dublin.
Birds, foxes and plants
For a man-made patch of former landfill, the reserve has done well: a wide range of plants has taken hold across its grassland and scrub. Birdwatchers come for skylarks, linnets, dunnocks, stonechats, wrens and herons, and in winter for the brent geese that graze the nearby grass and mudflats. More than one walker has been surprised by a fox. In spring and summer the rougher grass turns up wildflowers such as lucerne, melilot and broad-leaved everlasting pea, if you know what you’re looking at. Keep to the paths and give feeding and resting birds space.
The honest part: the smell
This is not a pristine wilderness, and it’s worth knowing why before you go. The reserve sits next to Dublin’s main wastewater treatment works and the Poolbeg incinerator, and on the wrong day, with the wind in the wrong direction, there’s a definite whiff. A high embankment screens the green strip from the industry along much of the route, which is partly why it feels as wild as it does, but the smell is the price of admission. Most visitors decide it’s well worth it: few people come here, and that emptiness is much of the appeal.
Walking out to Poolbeg
The Great South Wall and Poolbeg Lighthouse are a separate extension from the park. The 18th-century sea wall runs out into Dublin Bay to the red Poolbeg Lighthouse at its tip, with the Poolbeg Chimneys looming behind you and big views of the harbour mouth. Dublin Port reopened the roundhead after works in March 2026. The wall is exposed, and waves can wash across it. Check current notices and turn back if conditions deteriorate. Stay on the park paths for a shorter visit.
Visiting
- Choosing an approach: use Dublin City Council’s Ringsend and Irishtown walking map to pick a way in. Check gates, weather and any signs before setting out.
- Cost: free.
- Parking: check the map for access and use signed parking.
- Getting there: it’s an easy trip from Ringsend or Sandymount.
- Nearby: Sandymount Strand for a long beach walk at low tide, and the Great South Wall and Poolbeg Lighthouse for the full coastal version.