There is really only one town in Mayo.. Its called Castlebar

CastlebarMan · 05-07-2012 3:22pm #1

Every other place is a village. Discuss.

irishgeo · 05-07-2012 3:37pm

CastlebarMan wrote: »

Every other place is a village. Discuss.

You'll have the the westport lads up in arms.

I dont technically live in Castlebar town as i been told my estate is outside the Area covered by the town council.

The official declaration of a town

The Local Government act 2001 provides that from January 1, 2002 (section 10 subsection (3) Within the county in which they are situated and of which they form part, there continue to be such other local government areas as are set out in Schedule 6 which - (a) in the case of the areas set out in Chapter 1 of Part 1 of that Schedule, shall be known as boroughs, and - (b) in the case of the areas set out in Chapter 2 of Part 1 and Part 2 of that Schedule, shall be known as towns, and in this Act a reference to a town shall include a reference to a borough.
These provisions affect the replacement of the boroughs, Towns and urban districts which existed before then. Similar reforms in the nomenclature of local authorities ( but not their functions) are effected by section 11 part 17 of the act includes provision (section 185(2)) Qualified electors of a town having a population of at least 7,500 as ascertained at the last preceding census or such other figure as the Minister may from time to time prescribe by regulations, and not having a town council, may make a proposal in accordance with paragraph (b) for the establishment of such a council and contains provisions enabling the establishment of new town councils and provisions enabling the dissolution of existing or new town councils in certain circumstances
The reference to town having a population of at least 7,500 as ascertained at the last preceding census hands much of the power relating to defining what is in fact a town over to the Central Statistics Office and their criteria are published as part of each census.
Planning and Development Act 2000
Another reference to the Census and its role in determining what is or is not a town for some administrative purpose is in the Planning and Development act 2000 (part II chapter I which provides for Local area plans)
A local area plan shall be made in respect of an area which —(i) is designated as a town in the most recent census of population, other than a town designated as a suburb or environs in that census, (ii) has a population in excess of 2,000, and (iii) is situated within the functional area of a planning authority which is a county council.
Central Statistics Office Criteria
These are set out in full at http://www.cso.ie/census/documents/census_2006_Appendices.pdf
In short they speak of "towns with legally defined boundaries" ( i.e. those established by the Local Government Act 2001) and the remaining 664 as "census towns", defined by themselves since 1971 as a cluster of 50 or more occupied dwellings in which within a distance of 800 meters there is a nucleus of 30 occupied houses on both sides of the road or twenty occupied houses on one side of the road there is also a 200 meter criterion for determining whether a house is part of a census town.

Neworder79 · 05-07-2012 4:02pm

Depends what you mean by 'town', but on the face of it by Irish town standards, no. Urban boundaries can skew population numbers but Ballina isn't far off official Castlebar population for a start. Towns over 500 in Mayo from 2011 CSO figures:

Castlebar 12,318 +3.6%
Ballina 11,086 +6.5%
Westport 6,063 +10.7
Claremorris 3,412 +31.5
Ballinrobe 2,704 +28.9
Ballyhaunis 2,312 +35.4
Swinford 1,435 -4.5
Foxford 1,326 +25.3
Kiltimagh 1,127 +2.8
Belmullet 1,089 +1.4
Crossmolina 1,061 +14.1
Charlestown 914 +6.4
Knock 811 +8.9
Ball 671 +14.5
Newport 616 +4.4
Keel 582 +3.7
Killala 574 +0.9

van_beano · 05-07-2012 4:17pm

Don't think it really matters, I hear NAMA are going to demolish the village of Castlebar in the not to distant future and create a greenfield site......

qrrgprgua · 05-07-2012 5:00pm

CastlebarMan wrote: »

Every other place is a village. Discuss.

Hmmm... Lets see which town will have the biggest Tesco? Which already has the biggest Pennys. Which town has McDonalds requested planning to build one of its flagship restaurants? Which town has the most hotels beds in it?
Which town has the most representation in the Dail?

answer:- not Castlebar.

artyeva · 05-07-2012 5:44pm

when i moved to mayo one of the weirdest things i noticed was people calling places like bangor erris a 'town', and places that have 2 houses up a boreen a 'village'