Suburb is portrayed as segregation tactic

Dublin and Belfast are similar in that they are both no longer classed as industrial cities but metropolises where people are involved in service industries and where more than half of them live outside the city centre, a conference at Maynooth will be told today.

Addressing the theme, "Urbanism and Suburbanism at the End of the Century", Dr David Byrne of the University of Durham, England, will discuss how both Dublin and Belfast have fostered social exclusion by their suburban development.

Mr Dick Gleeson, deputy planning officer with Dublin Corporation, will also address the issue of social exclusion, explaining that after decades of neglect the regeneration of Dublin's inner city is now very much a part of the corporation's thinking.

In an address entitled "The Transport Rich and the Transport Poor: Car Dependency and Social Class in European Cities," Mr James Wickham, Jean Monnet professor of European Labour Market Studies at Trinity College Dublin, will argue that some cities are more car-dependent than others.

In a city such as Dublin, he claims, a car is a necessity to participate in normal life. Not to have a car is to be socially excluded.

However, in other European cities this is not the case, which leads to the conclusion that transport is not passive. It has major social effects, including social inequality.

Prof Neil Smith of the Geography Department at the Centre for the Critical Analysis of Contemporary Culture at Rutgers University, New Jersey, will discuss the design of a city and its suburbs as a matter of "revenge" between the social classes.

"Urbanism and Suburbanism at the End of the Century" was opened at NUI Maynooth, Co Kildare, last night by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey. It concludes today.