Kerry: Tralee, Caherciveen and Ballybunion 'lagging behind' but greenways give grounds for optimism
Around Walsh Dominick Vacancies Picture: In Attention Tralee Quinlans' The It Drew Closure To Temporary
Quinlans, the landmark seafood bar in Tralee town centre, has re-opened after renovation work.
But its temporary closure drew attention to the vacancies around it and the volume of shops that are no longer open.
Among the departed are Vila, Hogan’s Decorating Stores — which closed in March 2022 — and Jasmine’s ladies fashions. The latest business to shut up shop was Abrakebabra a few weeks ago. A ‘for sale’ sign now graces the front window of its former premises at the entrance to Tralee Shopping Centre.
Once you venture further into the centre, you immediately notice the one thing you won’t spend much time doing in the centre is shopping. That’s because so few shops are open anymore.
Indeed, since 2021 — when the Irish Examiner last visited the town for a focus on dereliction and vacancy — so many businesses have left that it is now being marketed as a film location, with the centre having its own film development officer.
She can be contacted on the Screen Kerry website, which is a platform for the film development office in Kerry and a “one-stop-shop for production support in the county”.
Like other Munster counties, the impact of dereliction and vacancy has served as a backdrop to tragedy. A few months after the 2021 investigation, a man involved in restoring a property on Ashe Street in the town died when a section of the building he was working on collapsed.
Well-known builder Tom Ross, 68, died and five others were injured after a chimney section of the building collapsed.
But while certain parts of Tralee town centre appear neglected, there is transformation in others, and — if the mayor is to be believed — still very much room for optimism.
In our 2021 focus on Tralee, there was “talk” that the town centre's Bridge Street Dunnes Stores building, which had been closed for years, had been sold to a sportswear chain.
Walking down nearby Pembroke St, it was not hard to spot empty or seemingly derelict or semi-derelict properties. Grass and weeds grew from chimney stacks overlooking the street.
One property stuck out as its sign had been taken off, its dusty windows shuttered from the inside, and its paint peeling and faded. It looked abandoned, but it wasn’t. Aidan O’Connor, the owner of The Greyhound Bar, was doing it up.
The pub, which employs 15, had been closed since March the previous year and inside it was a shell, stripped back to the bare brick walls. Today, weeds still grow from houses nearby on the street, but the bar is back open, and thriving.
The deal on the Dunnes Stores went ahead in the end and it is now a branch of the sports chain, Elverys. The boutique hotel being built opposite the town’s Garda station at the time is still being built, but is due to open.
While the famous Quinlan’s pub, also on Bridge St, was due to reopen in 2021, it is still closed, and still “due to open”. Emblazoned across the glass window at the front is “OPENING SPRING 2023”.
“Believe me, it is opening,” says auctioneer and recently appointed Mayor of Kerry, Jim Finucane.
“There have been a few delays as there would be with such an old premises but a huge amount of work has been done inside and it will be opening later in the year.”
On vacancy in the town centre, he said: “You could put it down to the lack of meaningful employment, and that impacts on footfall in any place, particularly the town centre. There is also a change in terms of the rise of online purchases.
“The lack of employment and the rise of online purchasing doesn’t explain everything, but these issues have impacted, especially on small retail shops."
He is, however, still optimistic about the town, regardless of how bad it looks today.
He points to the fact that the old Dunnes Stores shop is now an Elverys, and a number of other pubs and premises other than Quinlan’s are being renovated. Added to that, a toy shop that had closed in the town is due to be turned into flats.
“Obviously, one would like to see more activity,” Mr Finucane said. “I think all the various grants that are out there are beginning to get a bit of traction and we will see change."
While there doesn’t appear to have been a lot of work to renovate Caherciveen’s many derelict buildings, there is at least an abundance of optimism in the town, according to Colman Quirke who runs Quirke’s Newsagents on Main St.
This is mainly due to the impending arrival of the 32km South Kerry Greenway, which is seen as a make-or-break event for the town. Stretching from Glenbeigh village to Renard, the greenway will bring a lot of much-needed business to the town.
The biggest change since 2021 is the fact that the Aldi, which was being built in 2021, is now open.
But the Daniel O’Connell bar and restaurant, one of the most significant empty buildings in the town is — or appears to be — still empty.
Mr Quirke, who has lived in Caherciveen all his life, said: “There is optimism because of the impending arrival of the Greenway and more property has probably changed hands in the past year and a half than in the previous 10.
As far as derelict properties being done up in the town, he hasn’t seen much evidence of this.
Instead, he said, a number have changed hands.
“People can see the potential,” he said.
“When you were here two years ago, there was a proliferation of For Sale signs everywhere you went.
“You’d be hard pushed to find one now.
“So, while there may not be massive structural redevelopment going on at the moment, it is coming because of the 2025 arrival of the Greenway and people can see the potential.”
The big talking point around vacancy and dereliction in Ballybunion was so big, you could see it for miles around — and that was the Golf Hotel.
“It has since been done up to an adequate standard and it is now home to Ukrainian refugees,” said Kerry County Council councillor, Robert Beasley.
“There are no tiles falling off the roof and the accommodation is reasonable.”
On the other properties that were derelict or vacant in the town in 2021, he says little has changed and it has probably even got worse.
“Little or nothing has happened,” he said. “As far as I can see, none of the derelict buildings that needed to be renovated have been renovated.
“There just doesn’t seem to be the enthusiasm, for some reason or the other.
“It is also worth bearing in mind, Ballybunion is having a very bad season.
“The weather isn’t great and the cost of living is affecting Ballybunion big time and I would say it is the worst season in living memory.”
Back to the subject of dereliction, he said that it will take time for the impact to be felt around Kerry of the new incentives on offer to people.
When it was pointed out to him that every other county in Munster is very active on that front, and real changes are already being witnessed, he replied: “Kerry is lagging behind in a big way in relation to dereliction."
Kerry County Council says it only has 55 properties on its derelict sites list, and since July 2022 44 properties have been removed from the list.
Some €437,568 in levies have been issued in regard to 45 sites since July 2021, but the total amount received to date is just €8,508.53.
While the council currently has around 149 voids — council properties that cannot be lived in for the time being — 151 have been done up since July 2021 and put back into use.
The GeoDirectory Residential Buildings Report for the second quarter of 2023 noted 1,204 derelict properties in the county.
A county council spokesperson said the council did not have a figure for the number of derelict properties it was aware of but that were not on its derelict register.
The council was also asked what it has done to tackle dereliction, what schemes have been used to tackle the issue and what are the council’s plans or targets for the future as far as dereliction across the county is concerned.
A spokesperson said: “Kerry County Council continues to proactively pursue dereliction in the county using all of the various funding streams and legislation which are in place.”
If the Residential Property Price Register is anything to go by as an insight into property sales across Kerry, Tralee is obviously way ahead of towns like Caherciveen and Ballybunion since 2021.
Given Tralee is the capital of the county — which has seen its population rise 5.1% in the 2022 census to 155,258 from 147,707 in 2016 — that is understandable.
But the figure at least shows movement in the property market there — even if the centre of the town today appears to have more vacant properties than in 2021.
Countywide, there were 17,561 vacant dwellings and unoccupied holiday homes on census night in 2022 across Kerry, accounting for 22.5% of the county’s 77,824 housing stock. Of this figure, 8,849 were vacant dwellings and 8,716 were unoccupied holiday homes.
This is lower than the 18,257 total for vacant dwellings — which included 10,340 vacant holiday homes — in the 2016 census, when the housing stock was 75,319.
Of the 8,845 vacant dwellings (separate from unoccupied holiday homes) identified in the 2022 census, 1,816 were rental properties and 651 were recorded as being up for sale.
While some CSO census figures are subject to revision, they are an accurate reflection of vacancy across Ireland on a county-by-county basis.
Another view of things is the GeoDirectory database. Speaking of sales, since 2021, just 10 property sales were registered in Caherciveen between January 2021 and July this year, and while it had 23 to buy on Daft.ie on August 1, it had nothing to rent.
Some 64 property sales were registered over the same time frame in Ballybunion, while on Daft.ie there were just 17 properties for sale and none to rent on August 1.
Tralee showed up against no fewer than 1,010 recorded property sales between January 2021 and July this year.
While there were 73 properties for sale on Daft.ie in the town on August 1, there were just nine to rent. Its Commercial Buildings Report for the last quarter of 2022 noted commercial vacancy rates increased in 18 out of the 26 counties compared to the year before.
Given what you will see in the centre of Tralee at the moment, it is no surprise that GeoDirectory saw Tralee's commercial vacancy rate go from 15.9% in December 2021 to 18% a year later.
In its residential report for the second quarter of 2023, Kerry recorded an increase of 422 new addresses in the 12 months to June 2023. It also recorded some 368 buildings being constructed and a further 472 commencement notices for building work about to commence.