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9. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE WORK9.1 IntroductionThe Irish Landslides Working Group recommends that a large body of research be completed with regard tolandslide assessment hazard in Ireland, both in the short, medium, and long terms. The growing pressure fordevelopment in more marginal land areas, and the potential impacts of climate change, make further surveyingand research an important imperative on health and safety grounds and in the context of the sustainabledevelopment of the Irish landscape.Landslide hazard is a major geohazard and is included as a survey and research theme in the GeoscienceInitiative recently prepared by the Geological Survey of Ireland, and currently being proposed to Government forfunding. In addition landslides are being examined in an all-Ireland context. There has been extensive cooperationbetween the Geological Survey of Ireland and the Geological Survey of Northern Ireland on this andother geoscience themes. The work will require a multi-disciplinary team bringing together various types ofexpertise, and therefore a multi-agency approach.This landslides report lays the foundation of such research, in documenting the issues involved. Following fromthis there is an immediate need to increase public awareness about landslide risk in Ireland. In the medium tolong terms, gaps in our knowledge about past landslide events should be filled, surveying work needs to bedone to produce landslide susceptibility maps for Ireland, and research on the geotechnical properties oflandslide materials, such as peat, is required. Subsequent to this research, landslide issues need to be fullyintegrated into the planning process through the publication of planning guidance.Several key recommendations for future work on landslides in Ireland follow. Much of this work, by its verynature, will run concurrently to some extent. This is the case with the landslide susceptibility mapping and theresearch on the geotechnical properties of the materials in landslides. Planning guidance must await theextensive data compilation from surveying and the production of landslide susceptibility maps.The project work has been put into a broad order of priority to reflect the relative importance of the various workprogrammes. Within the second priority susceptibility mapping and landslides research are regarded as beingof equal importance.For each project, the main objectives are set out and estimated costs given to reflect a three-year programmein all cases. These are followed by the list of specific tasks involved in the project.The concluding section will outline the strategic framework to implement this work programme.9.2 Recommendations for Future Work1. Public Awareness/OutreachIt is important that there is much greater public awareness of landslide hazard in Ireland so that the generalpublic know of the potential for slope instability in certain areas and the possible consequences in terms of lifeand property.Main Objectives• Increase public/private sector awareness of landslide hazard in Ireland• Provide practical support and guidance to developers/regulatorsSpecific Tasks• Widespread distribution of the Landslides Report, including press releases to national and localnewspapers• Presentation of workshops on landslide hazard in Ireland89