Place Shaping in Fermanagh and Omagh

Place shaping is the creative use of powers and influence to promote the general well-being of a community and its citizens, collectively in a specific geographic area developing a shared vision and identifying what needs to happen to work towards achieving it.

It includes the following components.

• Building and shaping local identity.
• representing the community.
• regulating harmful and disruptive behaviours.
• maintaining the cohesiveness of the community and supporting debate within it, ensuring smaller voices are heard.
• helping to resolve disagreements.
• working to make the local economy more successful while being sensitive to pressures on the environment; understanding local needs and preferences and making sure that the right services are provided to local people; and
• working with other statutory and non-statutory bodies to respond to complex challenges that need collective action.

Place Shaping looks at how we can make our communities stronger and more resilient in the future through understanding what we have in terms of assets, i.e. our buildings, our green spaces, our brownfield sites, our skills and knowledge, our community groups, and our public services.

Place Shaping Plans are produced through a process of co-production and co-design ensuring they are reflective of the needs of the district and are owned by all the different partners in the development of an area. Place Shaping Plans present a shared vision for a geographic area, as well as outlines deliverable projects to achieve this vision. They build on the shared values and outcomes within FO 2030 Community Plan to offer a more localised and detailed place-based approach. The council have played a co-ordinating role in the place shaping process and will deliver some aspects of the plans but ultimately their success is dependent on all of the key partners delivering on the areas where they have influence and powers to do so.

The Council has committed to developing and delivering place shaping in collaboration with residents, statutory partners, community voluntary organisations, business, and other key stakeholders to develop long-term plans for our main towns Omagh and Enniskillen, initially. The aim to nourish the uniqueness and identity of both towns whilst balancing the needs of local people and our place and planet.

Collaboration is at the heart of what we do. Place Shaping Plans are co-created with local communities and stakeholders from amongst the community and voluntary sector, statutory and non-statutory partner organisations, business owners and landowners, big and small, investors and residents and local people.

You can view the Omagh and Enniskillen Place Shaping Plans below.