Carlow was to be a model town for sustainable living. Does it fit the bill, asks Frank McDonald, Environment Editor

Three years ago, the ESRI identified Carlow as an "emerging large commuter town" - even as an ambitious masterplan was being prepared proposing it as a "model town for sustainable living" in the 21st century.

The contradiction between that laudable objective and the depressing sprawl of car-dependant suburban housing on its outskirts remains a core problem for Carlow - especially with its ancient rival, Kilkenny, attaining "hub" status under the National Spatial Strategy.

Neither Carlow Town Council nor Carlow County Council has complete control over what happens in Carlow. The town boundary incorporates only a small part of the suburb of Graiguecullen, just across the River Barrow, and the rest of it comes under the jurisdiction of Laois County Council. This suburb of Carlow, within walking distance of the town centre, has become one of the fastest-growing areas in Laois. Its population rose by nearly 21 per cent between 1996 and 2002, and further growth seems likely based on the number of planning permissions granted.

There is regular contact between the three local authorities, but no agreed agenda on what should happen in Graiguecullen. Changing the boundary to make it legally part of Carlow would be as politically sensitive as, say, ceding Tinahinch to Graiguenamanagh in Kilkenny.

Residents of Graiguecullen threatened to run candidates in last year's general election if over-development was allowed to continue unchecked. One scheme alone involved nearly 700 new homes, on top of three housing estates already approved by Laois County Council. Their complaint, so familiar in other development hot-spots, was that its population was set to double without a corresponding increase in support facilities; just one road - known locally as the Numbers Road - would have to take the extra traffic from all the new housing.

The council's response was that this additional pressure on the local road network, caused by the new housing schemes it was approving in Graiguecullen, would in itself make a case for the National Roads Authority to expedite approval for a Carlow northern relief route. At the same time, Tullow residents on the Co Wicklow border feared they were being bypassed by economic growth. So in 2000, they produced their own plan to rejuvenate the town centre and rezone agricultural land for residential and commercial development.

A key element of the plan was to create an inner relief road for the town (population 2,314). Proposals were made that developers of the rezoned land would pay for the road, but Tullow is still waiting three years later.

The Carlow 800 masterplan - so-called because it marked the 800th anniversary of the town's royal charter - conceded the scale of suburban housing development on its outskirts would tend to intensify long-distance commuting to Dublin, just 50 miles north via the N9. Apart from Castledermot, Co Kildare, every town between Carlow and Newlands Cross, on the outskirts of Dublin, has now been bypassed, making Carlow more accessible to the capital. Road improvements have also encouraged commuting from rural locations in the county.

The proposed N9 motorway from Dublin to Waterford, as envisaged in the National Development Plan, will extend the radius of the commuter belt. As for public transport, there is only one Dublin-bound train a day of any use to commuters - it leaves Carlow at 6.30 a.m. According to the Carlow 800 plan, compiled by architects and urban planners Murray O'Laoire, commuting from Carlow is likely to increase until it is constrained by such factors as increasing traffic congestion and a slowdown in job creation in the Dublin area.

In the meantime, local movers-and-shakers such as John McLoughlin, owner of a hotel, pub and disco in the town, are dusting down plans for landbanks they have assembled on its outskirts. One site off the Tullow road is targeted for up to 1,200 houses and apartments. Brownfield sites have been slower to take off, though encouraging more "in-town living" was one of the central planks of Carlow 800.

According to Liam McGree, senior planner, the former tannery site is set to be redeveloped for apartments shortly. There is a lot of interest in "living over the shop" schemes and in the possibilities of developing apartments along the riverfront, though not much to show for it yet. A new shopping centre is planned off Barrack Street, at the eastern end of the town centre, to be served by the promised relief road.

Although the Carlow 800 masterplan and civic vision for the town won two certificates of merit in the Irish Planning Institute's annual awards last year, mainly for the extensive exercise in public consultation that lay behind it, putting it into practice is another matter. "The aim should be to establish Carlow as a domiciliary town, rather than a dormitory town," one source said. "The ambitions are good, at least on paper. But the key question about the masterplan is whether there's a will to see it through on the part of everyone involved."

The Carlow Environs plan, adopted in 2002, did show some restraint in not rezoning more land for housing. As McGree explained, this was in the interests of consolidating the urban area and encouraging the development of sites already zoned but still lying fallow. Carlow Town Council's latest development plan also emphasises the need for consolidation as well as mixed-use schemes to generate more employment. The latter is intended to overcome the town's "poor performance in economic terms", as the Murray O'Laoire plan put it.

The urban area accounts for more than a third of Co Carlow's population of 45,845, according to the 2002 Census. That showed a 10 per cent rate of growth since 1996. There is also concern that the National Spatial Strategy's designation of Kilkenny as a "hub" could hinder Carlow's economic prospects. Local politicians and officials are pinning their hopes on it being identified as a growth centre in strategic planning guidelines for the south-east.

Last year, the town received the largest single allocation - 3.2 million - under the Government's arts and culture capital programme. This is to be invested in the development of a contemporary arts centre, including a dedicated visual arts space and a performing arts theatre. Such an injection of funding is important for a town lacking a huge commercial rates base that can be tapped every year to finance local authority projects, including the creation of much-needed recreational facilities to cater for Carlow's haphazardly growing population.

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