Niall Cussen is a Senior Planning Adviser with the Spatial Planning Section in the Heritage and Planning Division of the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. Since 2000 he has been a key member of the team that prepared the National Spatial Strategy. Since the Government’s adoption and launch of the strategy in November 2002, he has been closely involved in its implementation through interactions with government departments and agencies as well as regional and local authorities. A former president of the Irish Planning Institute, Niall has worked as a planner for almost 20 years in a broad range of urban and rural contexts in both forward planning and development management at both local and national level. He served on the Steering Committees for the ICLRD/InterTradeIreland Spatial Strategies on the Island of Ireland 2006 report and the 2009 Newry-Dundalk Twin City Region and together with his colleague David Walsh, has been instrumental in promoting collaborative approaches between the National Spatial Strategy (RoI) and the Regional Development Strategy (NI).
Dr Conor Patterson is the Chief Executive of Newry & Mourne Co-operative & Enterprise Agency and President of the Newry Chamber of Commerce. Conor has been actively involved in the economic regeneration of the Newry and Mourne region since the mid-1990’s. Starting in Between 1997 and 2003 he was the Chairman of the Newry and Mourne Economic Forum and more recently he has been one of the co-ordinators of the Greater Newry Vision Partnership. From 2003-2005 he was the Chairman of Enterprise Northern Ireland, the federation of Local Enterprise Agencies in Northern Ireland. He is currently Vice President of Newry Chamber of Commerce and Trade and a Governor of the Southern Regional College. Conor has a Doctorate in Business & Economics from Kingston University in London. He is an MSc Economics graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, and a Chartered Urban and Regional Planner. Conor is accredited as a Mediator by the Mediation Network for Northern Ireland. He is a Member of the Institute of Business Consulting and a Member of the Institute of Economic Development.
Justin Gleeson is the Project Manager of the All-Island Research Observatory (AIRO) based in the National University of Ireland Maynooth. He is also heavily involved in a number of other projects with the National Institute for Regional and Spatial Analysis (NIRSA), the National Centre for GeoComputation and the ICLRD, including the published Atlas of Ireland –Mapping Social and Economic Change and a pilot project to develop a baseline of service infrastructure accessibility in both Irish jurisdictions. Justin has over six years experience working within the commercial and research GIS industry in the UK and Ireland.
