Ms Catherine McConnell:

I will begin with a brief summary on Ballinrobe, which was Mayo's participant town in this pilot scheme. Mayo County Council has identified it as a key town. It is strategically located to the south of the county between Castlebar and Galway. It is a long established market town in this part of south Mayo. Ballinrobe has consistently functioned well as a market town and has a strong urban block of about 6 ha which is bounded and defined by a strong streetscape. Consistent building frontages and relatively narrow street proportions emphasise the unique urban geometry. It is rich in natural built and cultural heritage assets. This has been enhanced by the town's success in attracting funding through various Departments under town and village renewal schemes, healthy town initiatives, the rural regeneration and development fund schemes and LEADER. Historic structures and projects include the Market House, the bower’s riverside walk and the library grounds, which have been enhanced.

When we engaged with the pilot project, our objective was to address the extent of dereliction and vacancy in the town centre because it has a major impact and affects perceptions and local confidence. Lack of investment has resulted in the built heritage losing some of its intrinsic value and attractiveness. Several areas are particularly affected and these are the ones we have focused on in the pilot.

The project looked at an adaptive reuse study of four different building typologies, three in private ownership and one recently purchased by Mayo County Council. Proposals for reuse, including commercial uses on ground floors and residential uses on upper floors, were developed. We examined how our approach to planning applications can affect these types of buildings. We also examined how the obligations to comply with building and energy efficiency regulations and to obtain fire safety certificates and disability access certificates combine to impact on how a developer might approach the reuse of these buildings. Preliminary structural surveys were carried out. Comparative estimates were prepared for the reuse of three existing buildings compared with the cost of providing similar accommodation on greenfield sites. The proposed use of the existing buildings extended across retail, office and residential accommodation.

The report has been circulated among members. It found that in general the cost of refurbishing these buildings is higher and there are many more barriers to a developer engaging with the redevelopment of these buildings. "Cost in use" is a term that we have used. It means that if one were to build to current standards, no developer could economically achieve the refurbishment of the existing building and compete with the market. This has had a major influence on whether people will refurbish or choose to move to new greenfield sites and build new developments.

Using the four buildings as case studies, we have held a workshop with businesses, residents, town centre property owners and previous town centre owners and-or residents and will continue to engage with them. We looked at previous town centre residents who chose to move out and have engaged with people who recently moved in to establish what was behind the decision to move out our move back. The workshop will aim to raise awareness of the extent and type of vacancy in the town. It will consider the challenges of adapting vacant buildings for reuse for modern 21st century family accommodation or business, the options for the reuse of these buildings, and the proposed means of supports or resources that would make adaptation more achievable. A second workshop will be held with our staff in the local authority to consider these means of supports or the resources Mayo County Council has at its disposal or are available through access to national funding schemes that could make adaptation more achievable.

We have appointed a consultant who will do a much more detailed analysis, explore the issues surrounding residential use and vacancy – the economic, social, environmental and cultural factors – and help us shape policies locally in our development plans and approaches to town centre redevelopment, which might inform national policy, both fiscal and otherwise, to encourage town centre reuse, both residential and commercial, and identify opportunities to guide and prompt public and private investment.

I will outline some of our preliminary findings. While a wide variety of funding options is in place, all of them require significant skill and time, which can be confusing for potential applicants who are not professionals in the area. A variety of complex reasons have led to levels of vacancy and dereliction, including land value, ownership patterns and the health of the local economy. Ballinrobe is typical of many other Irish towns in terms of architecture and development. Therefore, the solutions we may propose as a result of this study will be equally applicable to other towns.

A key issue facing Ballinrobe and other towns is that patterns of dwelling in recent years have tended to favour newly constructed dwellings in suburban multi-unit developments, or in one-off houses in hinterlands. The three main reasons for this are statutory risk, cost, and changing patterns of how people live and work. Increasing traffic through towns of the scale and size of Ballinrobe is a key issue. While the issue is being proactively tackled by Mayo County Council, it remains a challenge. Of the five towns surveyed by the consultants in Mayo, Ballinrobe was found to have the highest overall proportion of derelict structures and among the highest proportion of vacant units. However, it should be noted that this finding does not distinguish between commercial and residential properties. We used the opportunity provided by the pilot study to ask the consultants to develop a fully electronic geographic information system, GIS, database for each property which we have identified as vacant or derelict.

The properties will be geolocated and contain a full record of vacancy-dereliction status along with survey photographs and comments. This will allow us to track the progress of buildings that we hope will be redeveloped through access to additional funding and changes to the regime under which towns must develop themselves. The initial consultations with the owners of such buildings have indicated that the barriers are preliminary costs, those being, of renovation and repair. They also raised the issue of anti-social behaviour that is associated with higher levels of vacancy and non-residential populations in town centres.

We were heartened by the willingness of the building owners to engage in bringing buildings back into appropriate use and back to life if appropriate supports are in place. These would be a mixture of fiscal and other partnership approaches with the local authority. We will continue to engage with the town team and the properties' owners to see where this project will end up.