Carlow planning permission: how often it is granted, and how long it takes

How Carlow compares with the other councils

Carlow ranks 16th of 30 councils on the share of applications granted, with 90%, close to the 90% of the median council. The wait is longer than at the median council: 63 days against 55, so 8 days more for a typical decision. Some files drag on: one decision in ten took more than 258 days, about 4 times the median wait.

Carlow asks for further information more often than most councils: the register records a request on 47% of all the decisions it records, against 39% for the median council, and its decisions also take longer than the median. The register flags only 1 of Carlow's decisions as a one-off house, too few to compare with other applications.

The number of applications has held steady: 500 in 2019 and 473 in 2025. The busiest full year was 2021, with 523 applications; 20 of the 31 councils peaked in that year.

What Carlow reported for 2025

Carlow sent one of the smallest returns in the country. Its category counts add up to 251, and only Leitrim, Longford and Galway City reported less. Houses still make up the bulk, with 159 dwelling applications, but the remainder is more varied than its size suggests: 28 farm buildings, 19 industrial buildings, 15 commercial premises, 13 government, health or education projects and 10 social-use buildings. The council also recorded 7 civil engineering schemes, a line that 16 of the 30 councils in the returns left at zero or blank. Refusals were scarce, 17 in all, with 12 for houses and 3 for industrial projects; only Leitrim and Monaghan reported fewer. The council ruled 117 applications invalid. On speed, the return lists 151 applications decided within 8 weeks. Few refusals do not mean quick answers, though, as the register figures above show.

These figures come from each council's annual return to the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage: applications received in 2025, decisions to refuse and other measures, published under a CC BY-SA 4.0 licence. An application that fits several categories is counted in each, so the categories do not add up to a number of applications, and the Department notes that councils may have read its guidance in slightly different ways.

Following an application in Carlow

In the national register, Carlow applications link to their files on eplanning.ie/CarlowCC.