TAS Network Centre

Templemore Avenue School sits 500 yards from an interface between Catholic Short Strand and Protestant East Belfast. In 2002 this interface was an area which saw some of the worst violence in east Belfast and indeed Belfast, since the troubles began – the violence lasted 9 months.

The area from Templemore Avenue to the Short Strand has a long history of sectarian violence. Despite the peace process and paramilitary ceasefires, sectarian tensions between the predominantly Catholic community and surrounding Protestant districts continue to erupt into violence, which is often described as recreational rioting. This was particularly evident in 2002.

The need for reconciliation in Inner East Belfast is evident from a cursory glance at the neighbourhood; from graffiti to physical barriers, both long standing and more recent, there is unmistakable visual evidence of two communities that are deeply divided, not yet reconciled to each other, though there is less visible evidence that shows community leaders on both sides of the divide trying to effect a reconciliation process.

Research carried out by Neil Jarman, of the Institute for Conflict Research (ICR) at the University of Ulster in August 2005, set out to document all the existing NIO authorised barriers (i.e. those dividing communities) in Belfast. As a result of this exercise the study argued it is reasonable to identify 41 distinct barriers in Belfast, four of which are in and around the school. These barriers largely surround the nationalist Short Strand area and separate it from Albertbridge Road, Cluan Place, Templemore Avenue and Lower Newtownards Road.

The longevity of this contested interface, approaching 40 years in some parts, is also an area where over 100 people have been murdered during the troubles. It highlights the unusually significant ‘separating’ nature of the interface barriers in that they don’t merely divide territory but act to separate an entire community, Short Strand, from the rest of East Belfast, and indeed isolate it as a community.