The old ways are killing our towns — we have to move on
We must rip up the rule books on planning and conservation and be ready to bruise local egos to save our rural towns, argues Conor Skehan
THIS August as we wander around on staycation, reacquainting ourselves with rural Ireland, many will wonder why more isn’t done to halt the decline of our rural towns.
Many are surprised to learn that it is the old town itself that is usually the biggest obstacle to revitalisation — by getting in its own way.
The attempts of those who seek to continue to monopolise, own and control the biggest and best part of a town in the hope of future gains are usually the biggest obstacle to the very success that they dream of having.
Old towns die because those who are the establishment there usually have the most access to the power and money that resist change.
This means that success will almost never come about by leadership from within the town. Indeed, this is one of those few areas where the external influence of good government can make a significant difference to many lives without much costs.
The initial failure of older, smaller towns usually began in the 1920s because a combination of factors caused a downward spiral.
First, the towns lost their economic function — most smaller towns originally served a rural area within a radius of a half-day’s walk, say 15km to 20km. After the First World War, the arrival of tractors, trucks and cars broke this link so everyone could trade further away from home.
Secondly, as the economic role shrank, so too did the jobs. This caused workers — especially the less-encumbered young — to move away to larger cities in search of work, causing the population to shrink and age, and which accelerated the loss of trade.
Well-intentioned public policy on housing and conservation were often the last nails in the coffin.
Local authority social housing schemes were concentrated into smaller towns in a misguided attempt to halt population decline. This made the socio-economic profile less attractive to those with other options, so they inevitably moved to build in the more affluent countryside.
Meanwhile, excessively rigid conservation policies combined with unresponsive traffic planning made it unattractive and uneconomic to renew or redevelop sites in the town centre.
These smaller towns are now blighted by this combination of monopolistic land ownership, older, poorer populations and excessively restrictive planning policies.
Today most attempts to rejuvenate these towns are still based on emotional attempts to turn back time or to achieve ‘green’ development by reducing car use. In reality, a much stronger argument is based on hard-headed economics.
Firstly, towns are the highest concentration of the State’s capital investment in housing, schools, roads and water services. This is a powerful argument to protect investment as it is an opportunity to make the most of these assets instead of spending scarce public money by building afresh in new places rather than reusing the old.
Secondly, the delivery of all public goods and services is much cheaper and more efficient in the shared and concentrated setting of an urbanised area.
Finally, each existing town comes with that unique assembly of things that can only collect slowly over time that confer identity, such as sports clubs, historic sites and amenities that improve the quality of life.
What will success look like? First, we will need to alter planning and conservation restrictions so that places are not ‘loved to death’ by re-examining those rules for refurbishment and use that make it slower, more expensive, and less attractive to develop near the village core than on a greenfield sites along urban edges.
We also need investment in urban and suburban residential development sites — serviced, connected and convenient, subsidised if needs be, and made available as an alternative to rural locations on account of cost and quality — to a point where a ‘site from daddy’ becomes unattractive.
Lastly, and most importantly, we need to invest in site liberation by a combination of urban design, purchase, CPO and partnership to assemble large sites in core areas that offer the footplates for the needs of modern homes and businesses.
There is good Irish precedence for the benefits of blocking monopolistic factors that hinder economic development.
From the 1930s until the late 1960s, Ireland’s economy was ruinously held back by State-sponsored monopolies and the protection of traditional ‘sacred cow’ industries like footwear, clothing and leather.
For the last 50 years, EU competition rules, together with commitments to being an open economy, have swept away these shackles.
This makes Ireland different to many of Europe’s larger economies that still hobble themselves by trying to support larger manufacturing industries — especially for cars and planes as well as rail and telecoms.
The effort to fight monopolies and inertia never ends.
Now we are faced with the new challenge of trying to accommodate next-generation multinationals who need to operate at a speed and scale that is without precedent anywhere. How will the State accommodate and co-exist with these new realities?
The new need for co-existence and cooperation is very different to the traditional ‘command and control’ vision where the State calls all the shots. We must be prepared to change so we learn from and work with them. This has the advantage of having access to the finest minds and the deepest pockets right on our doorstep.
Every settlement is a small version of the national economy. Everyone wins if we are prepared to abandon old and familiar ways to revitalise our old towns. To achieve this we must recognise that old patterns of land use, land ownership and planning all need to change because these have become a fundamental obstacle to renewal.
Imaginative and intensive government interventions will need to consist of reorganising the basic fabric of these towns. Local vested interests and outmoded official approaches have to be challenged and changed.
The costs of these changes will mostly be bruised egos. It will be unpopular because a lot of people will need to change priorities. Many dreams will have to be recast, too. It may prove very difficult to summon up the political courage to face down opposition.
Sometimes good governance is like good parenting. The phrase ‘I’m your parent — not your friend’ captures the idea of someone who will tell you what you need to hear not what you want to hear.
We need to learn from our own successes in facing down the influential industrial, commercial and State-sponsored monopolies that held Ireland back for so long. It was slow and painful. Traditional jobs were lost, often causing great upheavals in lives and localities, but it was worth it. It led to an economic blossoming of the type that happens after a rose bush or fruit tree is well-pruned.
These changes, often unpopular, required political courage and honesty to deliver success that benefited the next generation and new places.
This is the type of honest discussion we need to have if we really want new lives for our old towns.
‘Invest in urban and suburban housing to the point where ‘a site from daddy’ is unattractive’