Councillors critical of proposed ideas for town regeneration
COUNCILLORS were largely critical of the ideas proposed by the firm of architects that has been contracted to carry out the regeneration of Carlow town centre. Carlow town had been allocated €13m from a new investment fund aimed at regenerating and revitalising town centres around the country.
Andrew Griffin, one of the firm’s partners, presented some proposed designs to September’s meeting of Carlow Municipal District. His plans included putting in a new pocket park on Charlotte Street, where the current council car park is. He also proposed to tighten the junction at the north end of Dublin Street to create more public space and to add furniture around the town for people to sit on, in addition to suggesting ways to ‘green’ Carlow’s streets through tree planting, flower beds and other green build-ups.
To make the town more pedestrian friendly, he suggested widening footpaths and creating spill-out space for cafés and businesses, particularly on the sunny side of the Charlotte Steet and Tullow Street junction. He noted that the regeneration would also mean the installation of new street lights.
However, while a lot of these proposals meant losing parking spaces, Mr Griffin said that he would prioritise and maintain parking, where possible. His proposals also included making wheelchair accessible parking bays built to a proper standard size and installing age-friendly bays on Tullow Street.
While all the councillors were in agreement that the investment and regeneration was a good thing for the town and expressed the hope that it would attract more people and business, they were quite critical of the plans proposed by Mr Griffin.
Cllr Fintan Phelan called some of the renderings “very clinical and very cold” and said that they looked “generic and very much AI-generated”.
Cllr Adrienne Wallace agreed with cllr Phelan and called for the designs to be more creative and unique to Carlow. She also queried how accessible some of the designs were, saying that some of the proposals “look great but are dreadful if you have any sort of mobility aid”.
Cllr Andrea Dalton called for there to be a mindset change when it came to parking in the town, noting that Carlow town has over 3,000 parking spaces and that people might have to get used to walking a bit further.
Paula O’Brien, Carlow Co Council’s director of services for planning, economic development, regeneration, finance, ICT, corporate affairs and human resources, told the meeting that the council is under severe timeline pressure to approve the first stage of planning under the guidelines of the investment fund.
Cllrs Paul Doogue and Fintan Phelan both said that the council needed to consult with local businesses about the proposed changes.
However, in the end, due to the severe restrictions placed on accessing the funds that have been allocated to Carlow, the councillors approved the ‘Part 8’ commencement, which means that approval has been given to start physical works on the site. It does not mean that works will start straightaway, as other processes like a commencement notice need to take place.
Mr Griffin agreed with much of the councillors’ feedback. He told them that there would be a detailed design stage where many of their concerns about the design not being Carlow-specific could be addressed.
Director of services Pádraig O’Gorman committed to writing to every business that might be affected by the proposed plans. The council also agreed to organise a public workshop so locals and businesses could make known their thoughts on the plans.
