A First for Balla: Town Centre Strategy

We need towns where low carbon living feels natural, not like a daily compromise. The way we shape streets and public spaces can keep people in cars or it can invite walking, cycling and slower, healthier routines. Climate-resilient architecture and urban design begin by reducing car dominance, reusing existing buildings, managing rainwater in the public realm and strengthening biodiversity corridors. 

Balla is a historic market town, rich with heritage and held together by a highly active community and a strong volunteer culture. But it is also a town under pressure. Its population has grown quickly and the centre still works as a route for traffic, with over 9,000 vehicles passing through each day. Safe routes to school are limited, public space is tight and vacancy, dereliction and housing pressure sit alongside valued ecological assets and a strong local identity. 

In the Balla Town Centre First Strategy, ACT brought these realities into focus and turned them into a shared direction. Drawing together existing plans and aligning them with people-first streets, heritage-led identity, climate resilience and community empowerment, ACT worked across the whole town, from the centre and public realm to housing estates, the town park, backlands and surrounding landscapes, setting out a prioritised series of actions.  

Locating the context and setting the programme

ACT worked with Balla as both place and system. As a historic market town shaped by heritage assets including the round tower, the courthouse and with monastic origins, it also sits beside ecological resources that matter at regional scale, including Balla Woods and the Balla Turlough Special Area of Conservation. This mix of heritage and ecology sets the terms for change and it demands care in how new connections and public spaces are formed. 

ACT anchored the Balla Town Centre First Strategy in Ireland’s Town Centre First Policy, consolidating local ambition already in motion. By drawing together the Balla Community Action Plan, the Biodiversity Action Plan and Tidy Towns strategies, ACT aligned them into one coherent direction that the Town Team and Mayo County Council could carry forward. 

From this point ACT shaped a town-wide programme with clear priorities focusing on town centre public realm improvements, traffic calming and active travel connections, with safer routes that support walking and cycling day to day. It also set out housing strategies, biodiversity projects, heritage trails and renewable energy initiatives, alongside capacity building for the Town Team. The aim is to make Balla more liveable and walkable, reverse vacancy and dereliction, strengthen biodiversity and heritage and guide housing growth in a way that supports the town’s long-term resilience. 

Shaping the design strategy

ACT began by reviewing existing plans and analysing available data. Thereafter, ACT identified key challenges and opportunities and tested spatial responses across streets, squares, parks and connecting routes. Priorities were reviewed and agreed with the Town Team to create a spatial approach that would aim to rebalance street space. ACT tested increasing footpaths and public realm space and a more defined sequence of squares, alongside improved thresholds and clearer visual connections to heritage assets. In parallel, ACT identified backlands for activation and stitched together more direct routes across the town. 

Working through community collaboration

Working with Mayo County Council, the Balla Town Team and local participants through scoping meetings, workshops, presentations, mapping exercises and facilitated discussions, ACT added community insight to the plan while also confirming priorities. 

As a result, local voices shaped what rose to the top. Priorities included traffic calming, reopening the train station, active travel, adaptive reuse of vacant buildings, biodiversity actions and public realm improvements. A high engagement workshop attended by the Minister for Rural and Community Development marked a key moment of shared focus. 

Embedding sustainability and climate resilience

In the Balla Town Centre First Strategy, ACT treated climate action as a town-wide design task, not a standalone chapter. The work begins in everyday spaces that shape how the town functions. The strategy integrates green infrastructure, stormwater management and biodiversity enhancement, alongside measures to reduce car dominance and support increased renewable energy uptake.

ACT used evidence-based decision-making, drawing on Central Statistics Office (CSO) data to keep priorities grounded. This highlights Balla’s 11 percent population growth since 2016, an ageing demographic, high car dependency, limited housing supply and low renewable uptake at around 17 percent of households. These insights helped focus where impact architecture could be most effective, defining the change needed and using data to guide decisions and monitor changes over time.

Strengthening access and daily life

ACT’s strategy is designed around the people who use Balla every day, and those who arrive for work, school, services or a visit. It is shaped for residents, commuters, local businesses, visitors, children, older people and community groups. The strategy supports safer streets and a stronger public realm so more people can move around the town with confidence. 

Key to accomplishing this was linking the town centre to housing estates, Town Park, Fair Green and surrounding landscapes. New pedestrian and cycle links, greenways, biodiversity corridors and safer crossings supported everyday trips and helped reinforce Balla’s identity as a historic, green and growing town.

Reflecting on outcomes

‘This project was shaped by the energy, insight and commitment of the Balla Town Team. By working together, we were able to turn a wide range of community ideas and priorities into a clear and coordinated plan for the town’s future’. - Simone Broglia, Urban Designer  

In the Balla Town Centre First strategy, ACT takes what already exists, places it side by side with community ambitions and blends this into a single story the town can use to achieve their vision for a resilient environment. This creates a shared baseline for investment, delivery and long-term stewardship. It also strengthens alignment between local knowledge and national policy. 

The most successful outcome so far is clarity. The strategy sets out prioritised, actionable projects with strong local alignment, so decisions can move from general ambition to agreed steps. It also demonstrates ACT’s capacity to translate community knowledge and policy into actionable, place-based strategies, showing how research-led urban design turns shared insight into practical next moves. 

Towns like Balla need change that is both grounded and deliverable. The next stage is about holding the line on purpose as projects move from strategy into action. When people, heritage and ecology are treated as shared assets, low carbon architecture becomes a daily experience, not a distant goal.