A number of people raised the issue at this week’s meeting of the South Central Community Safety forum, which took place at Turners Cross Community Centre.
![]()
Locals said they have seen groups of people congregating on and around Douglas Street, openly drinking and taking drugs.
They said it is occurring during both the day and the night and have called for An Garda Siochana to take action.
Cork City Councillor Tom O’Driscoll said the practise is unacceptable.
“I myself work in St John’s College and have seen a lot of it around there,” he said.
“It is a bit intimidating to be looking at this carry on and seeing people sitting in the car park on Rutland Street openly drinking and so on. A lot of elderly people in the area feel uneasy about it.”
He stressed, however, that he has not yet had any reports of harm being done to passers-by.
“In fairness to them, they don’t really bother the public as such, it’s more menacing to be looking at it that anything else,” he said.
“I know a lot of these people are very unfortunate, and I’ve never heard of them interfering with anybody, but it doesn’t look right and it shouldn’t be happening.”
He said the groups may have been moved on from the city centre by the gardaí, and are now congregating on the outskirts.
“A lot of them seem to have been pushed out of the city centre. They wouldn’t be tolerated on Patrick Street or the South Mall. But what it does is it just moves the problem to the back streets,” said Cllr O’Driscoll.
Gardaí are now considering extra patrols in the Douglas Street area.
Locals said they have seen groups of people congregating on and around Douglas Street, openly drinking and taking drugs.