Council to spend €24,000 on painting Tullow Street buildings
Colourful buildings on Dublin Street, Carlow town, painted by council. Image: Carlow County Council
OVER the course of 2026, Carlow Co Council will spend €24,000 on painting buildings on Tullow Street and Staplestown Road, continuing the success of the Streetscape Enhancement Scheme.
Kieran Comerford, head of enterprise, told a recent meeting of Carlow Municipal District councillors that the area office is currently open to applications for the scheme, which offers up to €1,000 to residential premises and up to €1,500 to commercial premises to paint the front of their buildings. The focus on the two streets “doesn’t mean other areas can’t apply”, but it is a prioritisation strategy, he explained.
Mr Comerford said that €64,000 was approved as the budget for Christmas lights. This prompted a debate between councillors about whether it was better to switch off the lights in town for the spring and summer to avoid people becoming tired of them or to keep them on to maintain a sense of atmosphere.
“I think they’re nice the way we’ve kept them there because they’re not overly Christmassy at Christmas time, but other times they just enhance the brightness of the street and it’s something different,” said cllr Phelan.
He asked about the prospect of extending them along Burrin river on Kennedy Avenue.
To cllr John Cassin, the fear is that people become “immune to seeing them when they’re constantly on”.
A poetic contribution on the subject came from cllr Fergal Browne, quoting Patrick Kavanagh in support of the argument to turn off the lights for the sake of preserving our wonder of the world.
Cllr Adrienne Wallace’s approach was ‘if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it’.
“I think it creates a lovely ambience,” she said, “and I bet you it would be the case where, if you start turning them off, you’ll have people on social media saying ‘what’s going on here’.”
Mr Comerford reminded councillors that they were the ones who had requested permanent lights to be installed around the town four years ago and said it was an “operational question” as to when they would be turned on and off. “But they’re put there to generally brighten up the town and the general sentiment we get is that they do generally lighten up the nighttime,” he said.
The final part of the annual service plan proposed by Mr Comerford was €8,000 to upgrade the entrance to Kernanstown industrial estate and to add signs to Strawhill industrial estate. Members passed the budget by a show of hands.
