The Council should commit itself to the restoration of our town centres and stamping out the scourge of vacant and derelict residential property that increasingly blights our town. Repopulating our town centres with associated improvements in pedestrianisation, reduced street furniture, increased amenities and public lighting should be a cornerstone of the Council’s housing strategy.
The council should investigate a scheme for the development of smaller and harder to develop sites through the sale of pre-serviced plots. Such schemes would allow people to purchase pre-serviced sites for the building of their own houses privately allowing the sustainable development of our towns in places such as the greenfield sites to the South East of Mountmellick main street. These self build pre-serviced sites could take the pressure and demand away from the trend to build one of private housing in very remote locations which is putting pressure on local services, communities and infrastructure and an increasingly spread-out county. The sustainable development of Cloughjordan Co. Tipperary could serve as a blueprint for the development of our towns in Laois.
Our town centres have been severely neglected over the past few decades which has prioritised peripheral development of our towns in both the retail, amenity and residential space. Our town centres need to be reclaimed through a process of traffic calming, tree planting, pedestrianisation and restoration of the built environment. Recent efforts by Dun Laoghaire Rathdown council have shown the positive impact such moves can have both on our civic pride, sense of community and local economy. Cars have been prioritised over people for far too long in all Laois’ towns and villages to the detriment of the people who inhabit them or increasingly used to inhabit them.
Civic spaces need to be restored and returned to the people. The top square in Portlaoise serves as a perfect example. In what should be the civic centre of our county town and county we find a heavily segregated space split between very fast flowing traffic along a national route and car parking facilities. The completion of the towns ringroad offers the perfect opportunity for the full reclamation of this important civic and social amenity through a program of pedestrianisation, rebuilding of the old town hall, tree planting and installation of appropriate street furniture.
Our council needs to become more proactive on the issue of protecting our heritage and using the full suite of tools it has available to it in the protection of our national heritage including compulsory purchase followed by remedial action and resale. The tragic and unwonted collapse of Coolbanager castle in 2014 was a timely reminder that our heritage, built environment and culture are in constant need of careful maintenance and are above private interest and/or neglect. The restoration of Ballyfin house and its competing on a global stage are also an indicator of the international interest that exists in our locality when properly cultivated and supported with cooperation between the authorities and enterprise. As an addendum to the countywide list of protected structures the heritage officer should develop a strategic plan for each of the national monuments judged as being in a vulnerable state with appropriate action taken annually based on the state of deterioration.