Nice country towns within 30 mins of Dublin

Hi

We are looking at relocating outside of dublin but want to be still close to our jobs which are in Dublin - 30 minutes drive max. We would like somewhere that has a decent size village with a good selection of pubs, restaurants, shops etc..Kildare is the obvious choice - with towns like Naas and Newbridge top of the list (although it seems hard to find a decent place to rent in either of these towns, standards are nearly as poor as Dublin albeit cheaper!)

Has any one any recommendations or anything to add to the above?

Looking forward to hearing your suggestions.

It might help if you say where you are driving to in Dublin, even generally - e.g Greystones to Artane would be a hell of a drive, but Greystones to Sandyford much less so.

j26 said:

It might help if you say where you are driving to in Dublin, even generally - e.g Greystones to Artane would be a hell of a drive, but Greystones to Sandyford much less so.

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Sorry, of course..I work in or around the Naas Road and my partner works in Tallaght.

Greystones in Wicklow or Maynooth in Kildare come to mind.
If you are not originally from Dublin take into consideration what Rd you might be traveling to visit home. eg I use the N4 so bought on the N4 route, it suited for work teh city centre and heading west when I wasnt to.

Ratoath, Co Meath is 12 miles away from the city centre. Tallaght is easily accessed via either the M2 or M3 motorway and M50. My in laws live in Tallaght so we do that journey frequently

Some terrible suggestions there.

Living in Ratoath will cost your household about €170 per month in toll charges.

Maynooth is in a needlessly awkward location. You are running the gauntlet of the N4 and M50 every day (N4 had 30 min delays today) when you could have it much easier. Either that or lots of back road messing.

I would look around the many villages between Naas and Wicklow. Blessington, Ballymore Eustace etc.

Where were the delays on the N4? Its 3 lanes all the way to M50 so where was the backlog?

Maynooth suggestions sound good. You need to take into account his observations, then on a map look at potential routes and therefore identify potential locations. Then get in the car and have a look at these places, and/or post for info on these places as places to live on some forums to get some feedback. Of the ones you like I would seriously recommend trying your future commute from the shortlisted location(s) at least once in both directions before making any final decision.