Historic Towns Initiative
An initiative to promote heritage-led regeneration and to improve the quality of our historic towns and villages for residents and tourists.
2019
A Heritage Council project in partnership with the National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI), BirdWatch Ireland (BWI), Bat Conservation Ireland and the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group (IWDG).
A Heritage Council project in partnership with the National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI), BirdWatch Ireland (BWI), Bat Conservation Ireland and the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group (IWDG).
In 2019, the Heritage Council received funding from Creative Ireland to run a pilot programme of workshops focused on bringing a heightened experience of the natural environment to people with sight impairment.
We believe that if people are assisted to interpret the sounds of biodiversity in their daily environment, they will have a richer experience of our natural world. Furthermore, they will enjoy the outdoors more while appreciating the birds and animals sharing our world.
Since its inception, our workshops have centred around Ireland’s native fauna. As the attendees have impaired or no sight, they tend to have a limited understanding of the comparative sizes of birds or animals. Our introductory class is designed to help them appreciate the varying sizes of birds and animals and we use a selection of species, preserved by taxidermy, which are easily handled by the group and proving to be a great success.
Other classes are focused on the calls of Irish wild birds, with our partners BirdWatch Ireland, identifying species which you are most likely to hear in their environment.
From later discussions with NCBI clients, it became clear that the clients were interested in further workshops. The Heritage Council contacted Bat Conservation Ireland (BCI) who agreed to develop a bespoke education workshop for those with slight impairment. These bat workshops centre on a presentation, which has recordings of the echolocation of our Irish bat species. Dried-out specimens of bats too are used which the class really engage with.
The Cetacean workshop brings the world of subsea sonar to the classes. The Irish Whale and Dolphin Group blend props, in the form of skulls and baleen, with recorded whale and dolphin songs and calls, to demonstrate how our sea mammals communicate.
The final workshop is always a field trip, taking place in December. The group are taken into the field to trail their learnings, in the past, we have visited the North Bull Island Visitor Centre, which forms part of the Dublin Bay Biosphere Reserve. From here we lead the group on a guided ‘Bird-Hearing’ tour of the back-strand mudflats. Along the way the class, with assistants, stop to listen to the seabirds, waders and wildfowl calls offered by the resident Brent Geese, Oystercatchers and on occasion, even some passing Ravens.
For further information please contact Lorcan Scott (Wildlife Officer): lscott@heritagecouncil.ie or 056-7770777.
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An initiative to promote heritage-led regeneration and to improve the quality of our historic towns and villages for residents and tourists.
A collaborative approach to village planning and design that gives local communities a real voice in deciding how their villages are planned and shaped for the future.
A trans-disciplinary Collaborative Town Centre Health Check Programme which was carried out in conjunction with participating towns across the country.