Belfast is looking up for 2017 – literally – as a growing number of construction cranes vie for space on the city’s increasingly busy skyline. At the last count, there were nearly 20, which marks a fresh record for the bleak post-crash days, when construction cranes had all but vanished from view for a period.
The surge in building is a very positive sign of what lies ahead for a city that has unveiled plans to attract £1 billion of additional investment by 2035, according to Nuala Gallagher, the first director of development with Belfast City Council, The city council has just published a new “Belfast Agenda” which sets out what it admits are “bold ambitions”. Among these is a desire to create 50,000 additional jobs within the city boundaries and attract 70,000 new residents to come work, live and “play” – whatever your age – in Belfast.
A “renewed optimism” is visible across the city, Gallagher says, even with looming Brexit issues to contend with – and despite the simmering local political tensions that threaten to yet again derail the Northern Ireland Executive.
The Belfast Agenda is the city’s first official community plan and Gallagher says it sets out a clear plan about what the council hopes to achieve. “The agenda is really about playing to Belfast’s strengths, it has been produced by a partnership of organisations that are involved in the city including public and private organisations and voluntary and community sectors – and we are all committed to working together to create a great place for everyone to live and a successful economy.”
Gallagher says the city has some strongly established foundations to build on. For example, in 2015 Belfast had one of the strongest city economies in the UK, according to the Office for National Statistics, while Titanic Belfast last month was crowned the world’s leading tourist attraction at the World Travel Awards in the Maldives. She says the challenge now is to take all of Belfast’s existing strengths and marry them with the council’s ambitions for the city.
The fact Belfast is a “young” city – 42 per cent of the city’s population is under the age of 30, with over 650,000 people living within the wider Metropolitan area – is also one of the reasons that Belfast City Council why investors and local stakeholders will see a reason to invest in its future.
“This is about a step change for Belfast,” Gallagher says. “Over the last two years, the council has asked people what kind of city they want in the future and over the next four years we are going to focus on key areas to achieve our objectives and one of the top priorities is economic growth. Regenerating the city centre is fundamental to that and to Northern Ireland because of the role Belfast plays in the wider local economy.”
As the first director of city centre development with Belfast City Council, she is in the driving seat. Gallagher’s previous career in international urban development has taken to key roles in London and New York. She believes that Belfast can easily borrow from tried and tested initiatives in both cities that will help transform its future.
“We need to make sure that we are creating the right mix – from offices to retail to hotels, tourist attractions, universities, colleges – even creative industries and, of course, housing. When we look at what Belfast can currently offer, we are in a good place – we have Queen’s University and the new £250 million Ulster University campus currently under construction and the Metropolitan College all within the city, so that it is one of our strongest selling points. Then if we just look next at the overall cost factor for businesses, Belfast, which is a compact city, is hugely competitive, particularly on rental values compared to other key hubs like London or Dublin, and all of these factors will help us deliver.”
The plan also involves a hugely ambitious future project to rival the success of Titanic Belfast, a new cultural hub in the city centre that could include a new £100 million major visitor centre that would depict the “Belfast story”.
