Tribeca. If only we could have seen it coming? Well, we did – the people of Belfast mobilised against Tribeca and were ignored by councillors who voted for it. The councillors and planning officials were sold on the idea.

Now they must feel like like Homer Simpson when the Monorail man came to Springfield to promise all sorts of shiny things, before doing a runner with all the cash. It would be funny - if it wasn’t true.

The joke was so obvious when international tricksters, the Yes Men came to Belfast in 2020. Dressed like businessmen who smelled like dollars and speaking in over the top American accents they were invited in for tea and coffee with decision makers and given unprecedented access to swanky events. Their response to the Tribeca plan was to put up billboards pretending that Councillors had rejected it in favour of the development of a community led eco-village at the Mackies site.

The current Chief Executive of Belfast City Council and then City Solicitor, John Walsh, didn’t see the funny side. Council sent a legal threat to PPR (not the Yes Men, the organisers of the prank, who also happen to have a lot of high paid lawyers) for which we later received an apology. But who is going to apologise for Tribeca? Who is laughing now? Who benefited? Who is responsible? Who will step up to say ‘never again’?

Image caption: Dressed like businessmen who smelled like dollars and speaking in over the top American accents they were invited in for tea and coffee with decision makers and given unprecedented access to swanky events

Contrast Tribeca with the work led by homeless families in Belfast. While Tribeca was failing to deliver even the paltry 24 homes it promised, Take Back the City was leading a community led design process, building a coalition of international experts to develop a master plan for Belfast’s first sustainable community.

…the city centre is a mess, the council is a laughing stock and the people are left with the bill in a city with 5000 officially homeless kids, whose parents are ignored by Ministers and Chief Executives and forced to take to the streets to protest for their rights

While Tribeca was leaving the city centre to lie in ruins, Take Back the City was building community gardens, planting wildflower meadows, organising homeless families, and creating operas. While secret meetings were happening at council, Take Back the City were hosting open forum democratic decision making processes, harnessing the hopes, dreams, ideas, and votes of thousands of people to refine a plan to help communities, deliver homes, create employment, support the natural environment and overcome the sectarian carve up which has crippled our peace process and normalised inequality and the denial of human rights.

While Councillors were voting against Take Back the City, they voted for Tribeca.

It seems that in spite of all the flashy promotional material, the scheme did little more than bank land and property - could this too have been in the hope of flipping it to the highest bidder? Maybe we’ll never know. It’s unlikely that anyone at Belfast City Council wants to go down that rabbit hole. Now the city centre is a mess, the council is a laughing stock and the people are left with the bill in a city with 5000 officially homeless kids, whose parents are ignored by Ministers and Chief Executives and forced to take to the streets to protest for their rights.

It’s not one bit funny. If we always do what we’ve always done, we’ll always get what we’ve always got. The battle for the future of Belfast is Take Back The City vs Tribeca. If you know what side you are on please use your voice today in support of a better future.