2010 National Planning Conference, Tullamore Co. Offaly.

 

The Planning Committee presented on behalf of the DIT Planning class, the Local area Plan of Bettystown-Laytown in Co. Meath. We presented it to Meath County Council and also to Minister Ciaran Cuffe at the IPI Conference in Tullamore. The Planning Conference was held for two days and we would like to thank our Lecturer Paul Lawlor for his enthusiasm. An enjoyable two days was had by all the Planning Committee.
I would like to congratulate Aoife Doyle, Rachel Ivers and Jean Ryan who will be representing DIT at this years Planning Conference in Galway. Best of luck!

This May 2010 report is on the DIT Archive website (http://www.dit.ie/).

Minister of State Ciaran Cuffe with DIT Spatial Planning Students (from left), Colin Broderick, Eoin Stapleton, Aoife Doyle and Aine Geraghty.

The 2010 National Planning Conference took place in Tullamore, Co. Offaly on April 15th and 16th last and DIT Students from the School of Spatial Planning (Bolton Street) made a presentation of their recent Local Area Plan Project of Bettystown in County Meath to both Delegates of the Conference and the Minister of State for Planning and Heritage, Ciaran Cuffe.

Aoife Doyle and Aine Geraghty from DIT presenting the Bettystown Local Area Plan Project to Minister of State Ciaran Cuffe.

The Local Area Plan Project of Bettystown was completed in partnership with Meath County Council between September and December 2009. The Project focussed on a number of key themes which were seen as particularly important to the sustainable planning and future development of Bettystown. These key themes, which were identified by DIT Spatial Planning students during their survey and during discussions with Meath County Council, were as follows;

• Sustainable Housing & Settlement
• Transport
• Social Infrastructure & Economic Development
• Heritage and Conservation
• Tourism
• Open Space & Recreation

The Local Area Plan Project is a Third Year Module in the BSc Spatial Planning (DT106) Programme http://www.dit.ie/faculties/built/spatial-planning/environment/bscprogrammes and it is intended to give students the practical experience of preparing a Local Area Plan for a location in Ireland. This module is normally undertaken in conjunction with the forward planning sections of a Local Authority who identify a town or settlement in their county that they would like to see covered and prepare a project brief in conjunction with the academic staff of DIT. The students are then briefed by the Local Authority Planners during the field survey and the preparation of the draft Local Area Plan takes place over a three month period. The final Local Area Plan Project is presented to the Local Authority Planners at the final Crit. Projects undertaken to date as part of this module are as follows;

• Portarlington (2006): Offaly County Council
• Clara (2007): Offaly County Council
• Glendalough & Laragh (2008): Wicklow County Council
• Bettystown (2009): Meath County Council