Bed sits are being proposed as a fix for New Ross’ vacant premises issue, but not all agree

By Simon Bourke, Wexford People

With over 200 possible residential units in the centre of New Ross an argument has been made to breathe life back into the town by converting them into bedsits. That argument took place at the June meeting of the New Ross Municipal District (NRMD) where councillors debated the merits of allowing empty spaces above shops to be used by developers.

However, there was some opposition to that argument with Councillor Michael Sheehan pushing for an increase in commercial activity in New Ross.

“We need to protect the retail town core, it’s wide open for any kind of development; if someone comes in and turns a retail unit into a one-bed apartment it’s gone, there’s never going to be a commercial entity in there again,” he contested.

“New Ross has the highest number of vacant commercial properties in the county,” he began. “Rather than have no-one in these old buildings and leave them derelict, we should put people into them, bring some energy into the town centre, have people in there spending money.”

“Retail probably can’t save the town centre at this point,” agreed Cllr Marty Murphy. “Any bit of life in the town is better than dereliction; running a small shop in a small town is almost impossible now.”

Regarding the possible introduction of new businesses in the town, Cllr Pat Barden noted that the council had a town regeneration officer who was “working hard” to bring life back into New Ross.

“But we don’t have people living in our town centre and that’s the biggest problem we have,” he added. “If we want people living in the towns we’re going to have to incentivise using the buildings over the shops. There’s 250 premises between the streets in the centre of this town with absolutely nothing happening in them – some are derelict but some are shops which have two or three storeys empty above them.

“The regeneration officer is going to have to put beds in those rooms.”

But Cllr Sheehan was not for turning.

“It’s better to have something than nothing but developers are going to rock in here and they know what the minimum size is for a bedsit,” he said. “They’re going to put them everywhere, cram people in like sardines, get as many in as possible. It’s a lot easier to turn a ground floor space into a €2,000 a month apartment than go out and hustle for a commercial entity. If we don’t protect the town core all we’re going to have is bedsits and no shops.

“It’s already happening in Charles St, we have four functioning businesses there, and there’s nothing attractive about it.”

Striking a positive note, Cllr Barden reminded his colleagues that, despite their concerns, New Ross was on an upward trajectory.

“We shouldn’t lose sight of what’s happening in the town, I was talking to a man today who was back here for the first time in ten years and he couldn’t believe it was the same place, he said it’s changed so much, it looks absolutely brilliant. So we’ve done an awful lot right, it’s really on the up.”