Don’t waste chance to prepare for tomorrow
IT is right that Louth County Council are to include Bridge Street in the plans to redevelop St Nicholas Quarter which includes Clanbrassil Street and Church Street but the thought does spring to mind of spreading the jam too thinly.
We can’t have everything and the grant allocation to do the work will not stretch to cover a bigger geographical area with some compromise, so will we be told what the compromises will be.
Will it be quality of material used, quality of design, or will it be cut and stunt job with part of the work complete to a satisfactory standard and then the rest of the work continued, if and when the funds become available.
We cannot cut off part of the town, indeed a traditional retail part of the town at that, but the deal reached seems a case of kicking the can down the road.
I recall the past two decades as more and more houses in Dublin Street were changed into retail units, councillors of then Dundalk Urban District Council were concerned at the change of use in the planning applications from residential to commercial.
They were concerned that we were losing residents in our town centre, which would become deserted in the evenings and they were concerned that we were spreading the retail zone of the town too thinly.
Dundalk’s retails streets are a linear line from Bridge Street, Church, Clanbrassil Street, Crowe Street, Francis Street, Earl Street, Park Street and Dublin Street with a few retail spurs off that main drag.
All of those concerns were voiced before the Long Walk Shopping Centre, Carroll Village, Dundalk Retail Park and the Marshes Shopping Centre and before the advent of online shopping.
The face of retail shopping is change, it is not dead and gone, but is vastly different than ten or fifteen years ago.
The funding to re-develop the St Nicholas Quarter is of course welcome and anyone who walks our town centre streets knows only too well, how badly our footpaths for one need a revamp, but the plans to date look like they are aimed at tackling yesterday’s challenges when we really should be using the opportunity to face up to the challenges that tomorrow will bring and try to map out a vision for our town centre that will carry us forward.
T THE DEAL REACHED SEEMS A CASE OF KICKING THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD