Letterkenny born economist takes up specialist post

By Kate Heaney

LETTERKENNY-BORN specialist economist Catherine Murray has joined one of the country’s top property advisor practices, Turley Property.

The former Loreto Letterkenny student was previously Chief Economist with AECOM Ireland where she headed up their economics team since 2018.

The local woman specialises in the economics of place and has over 20 years’ experience in consultancy, local Government and academia, from which she brings a deep commitment to sustainability, through her training in Ecological and Environmental Economics.

Speaking to the Donegal News yesterday Catherine explained that after five years with AECOM she is delighted to take up her new role with Turley as Director and Head of Economics Ireland. The company have offices in Derry, Belfast and Dublin.

“I specialise in planning and environmental economics. I spent 15 years in New Zealand and then moved back home. I worked in the transport area and helped develop a few mega transport projects. Greenways and active travel schemes,” she said.

“A lot of it is measuring what benefits the whole country rather than for private benefit. Who benefits from infrastructure projects? We did a lot of work with Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) on Greenways and it can be used to measure the potential benefits all over the country,” she said.

Catherine brings a wealth of experience working with local authorities on master planning, economic development and public realm/place making projects, alongside building business cases for funding and undertaking economic and financial appraisal for semi-state bodies.

According to Turley her joining the company sees them continue to grow their economics offering which delivers a wide range of services including economic, social and health impact assessments; housing and social infrastructure needs assessments; retail and employment work and business cases and funding advice.

“I’m very excited to join Turley in Dublin. I have worked internationally, have observed different approaches taken to economic planning, learned what works well and am aware of how economics can contribute to better decision making at a societal level.

“I’m deeply committed to creating resilient communities in a low-carbon future.

“This can only be achieved through considered planning, developing tools that incorporate foreseen consequences along with the random unknowns, as our ways of living change and evolve,” she added.

Catherine lives in Dublin but loves to get home to visit parents Tony and Mary at Convent Road in the town.

She is a former pupil of Scoil Mhuire gan Smál and Loreto Letterkenny.

“I still have a lot of good friends from home and like to get back as often as possible. I have a number of colleagues in Derry and Donegal, Lee Hannigan, Paul McMonagle and Conor Campbell,” she added.

Turley have been delivering projects in Ireland since 2017 and established their Dublin office in 2020 to complement the Belfast and Derry offices.

They offer Economics, Planning, Strategic Communications, Design, EIA, Sustainability and ESG services across the island of Ireland.

They are also working with a wide range of private and public sector clients in Ireland including Glenveagh Homes, Lioncor, Scannell Properties, SSE, Alanis Capital, Dublin City Council, Cork City Council, Kilkenny County Council and Uisce Éireann (Irish Water).

Speaking about the appointment of Catherine, Anthony Pollard, Head of Economics at Turley said: “With Catherine joining us we are deepening our roots in the Irish market and enhancing our location-specific knowledge and connections.

“We are incredibly excited to grow our economics service in this way.

“Catherine’s diverse skillset is borne out of economics specialisms which have become increasingly important in helping our society tackle the climate emergency and to create social value,” he added.

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