Minister Joe O’Brien launches Town Centre First Plan
The Lusk Town Centre First Plan was launched today (24th May 2024) by Minister Joe O’Brien at Lusk Cultural Centre. The project was funded by his Department of Rural and Community Development.
The National Town Centre First (TCF) policy is key to the regeneration and revitalisation of our towns. The TCF Policy, launched in February 2022, pays special attention to tackling vacancy, combatting dereliction and breathing new life into our town centres.
It advocates for a place-based approach to the revitalisation of towns and villages of all sizes. It focuses on local communities charting the future direction of their towns, developing a cohesive vision that serves a wide variety of interests from accessibility, to business, to recreation and cultural, to sustainability.
Town Teams, which comprise a wide range of community stakeholders. supported by local authorities, develop these new ambitious plans for their towns based on the particular strengths and assets of the town. Fingal was awarded funding for the development of a Town Centre First Plan for Lusk, which has now been completed.
Minister Joe O’Brien stated on the day:
“This plan is bespoke to your town and was developed in a bottom-up manner and identified specific opportunities, challenges and project interventions to regenerate the town.
The plan will assist Lusk in accessing funding and investment available for town regeneration projects across several government departments and agencies.
A great example of the benefit of having a town plan in place is the very building we’re standing in today – your wonderful community cultural centre.
It is great to see that this building, which was derelict at one time, has now been renovated and transformed to such a high standard and it is certainly a centrepiece in the heart of the Lusk area.
My Department has also announced further funding to Fingal through the Town Centre First Suite of Supports.
Funding has been awarded to complete a further Town Centre First plan for Rush, and the communities of Ballyboughal, Donabate and Balrothery will be supported with funding through the Town Team Support Fund in order to establish and develop town teams in their localities.
The town team here in Lusk will be further developed by training and capacity-building opportunities provided by the National Town Centre First office.”
More detail on Town Centre First at this link:
