Belfast has been selected as one of just 24 cities worldwide to receive $1 million in funding through the Bloomberg Philanthropies Mayors Challenge, backing an ambitious plan to rethink how the city’s alleyways are managed and improved.
Chosen from more than 630 applications globally, Belfast now joins a cohort of cities across 20 countries recognised for bold civic ideas. The focus here is simple but significant: how small, often overlooked spaces can become better cared for, safer and more community-led.
Alleyways are part of everyday life in much of the city. They sit behind terraces, connect neighbourhoods and often become the quiet battlegrounds for waste management, fly-tipping and anti-social behaviour. The new funding will allow Belfast to test a different approach, moving away from purely reactive responses and towards collaboration with residents.
During the development phase, the council carried out extensive engagement with communities, including surveys and face-to-face conversations, exploring how people want to shape and care for shared spaces close to home. The project will now move into a testing phase, trialling new tools such as local resource hubs, small grants for resident-led initiatives and better use of data to support long-term maintenance.
Rather than imposing a one-size-fits-all solution, the aim is to recognise that every alleyway and every neighbourhood is different. What works in one part of the city may not work in another.
For Belfast, the award is not just about funding. It signals international recognition of the city’s willingness to experiment with how services are delivered and how communities are involved.
Sometimes the most meaningful change begins in the narrowest spaces.
