- Urban Regeneration   150 kb by    O Connell, Derry | derry.oconnell@ucd.ie    Short Outline The Paper describes a particularly unusual approach to block regeneration in a small urban centre,as pursued in a recent award winning plan. Abstract Isocarp abstract / paper proposal 2005 Planning for the Creative Use of Small Sites This paper examines a sequence of two innovative Urban Regeneration Plans in a small Irish town over a ten-year period, tracing the advancement of their response to the economic viability of individual site development over that period. The town is Sligo, in the northwest of Ireland, which has an urban population of 18,000 but with a dependent hinterland of up to 50,000 which gives its centre a strong service function as a central place. An Urban Regeneration Plan was adopted in 1992 which took a new approach in its site-specific remit. The Plan sought to develop the economic viability of small sites within the mediaeval street fabric. It did so by securing a frontage exposure framework in a delicate process that in some cases required land swapping and realignment towards the creation of viable site shape and profile. In the five years that followed, this Plan had the effect of turning a central block of the town from a state of dereliction to a state of complete re-occupancy. The Plan has received a number of awards. In the momentum so generated, a second Plan was adopted in the spring of 2000 that carried the rejuvenation process into an adjacent block of larger later sites, developing these with a focus on the relationship between site shape and economic viability. The urban fabric which resulted from this second Plan is currently under construction. These two plans together have pursued a new and non-traditional approach to regeneration, which works with the modern demands of emerging new uses in the meticulous matching of these to traditional frameworks. The paper analyses the unique approach taken by the plans, and their relationship to each other, with particular emphasis on their ability to address and harness the circumstances of individual stakeholders in a complex relationship of individual sites where existing subdivisions and morphology required to be preserved while facilitating the needs of rejuvenation. Derry O’Connell April 2005 Keywords Urban Design Urban Regeneration Block Morphology Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2005: Making Spaces for the Creative Economy   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper