Belfast Metropolitan Area Plan 2015
Introduction: Plan Area

The Plan relates to the administrative Council Areas of Belfast City, Lisburn City, Carrickfergus Borough, Castlereagh Borough, Newtownabbey Borough and North Down Borough. In total this is a Plan Area of approximately 960 square kilometres, with a population of 646,550 (Northern Ireland Census 2001), which represents approximately 38% of the total population of Northern Ireland.

The Metropolitan Urban Area¹ lies at the head of Belfast Lough and the lower reaches of the Lagan Valley and dominates the Plan Area. It has one of the most striking landscape settings to be found in any Metropolitan Urban Area in  the British Isles, being flanked to the north west by the basalt escarpment which forms the southern edge of the Antrim Plateau and on the south east by the more gentle escarpment of the Castlereagh and Holywood Hills. The Metropolitan Urban Area is the major gateway to Northern Ireland and the primary administrative, retail and commercial location within the Region. In recent years it has been the key driver for an improving regional economy and the RDS states that it will retain a strategic role in the future economic growth and development of Northern Ireland.

The Metropolitan Rural Area² contains 76 settlements, including the 6 small towns of Ballyclare, Carryduff, Greenisland, Hillsborough, Moira, and Whitehead, 23 villages, and 47 small settlements, together with the open countryside.

The Metropolitan Rural Area includes a wide variety of landscapes ranging from the broad lowland valleys of Newtownabbey to the undulating terrain of the Castlereagh Hills and it extends from the rolling upland drumlins of Dromara to the shorelines of Belfast Lough and Lough Neagh. Agriculture continues to be an important activity within the countryside.