The six-seat Tullow area was a new creation, but was largely similar to the area covered by the Tullow electoral areas which had existed before 2014.
Six sitting councillors contested – John Pender (FF), John Murphy and Brian O’Donoghue (FG), Willie Paton (LAB), Jim Deane (SF) and Charlie Murphy (IND).
| NAME | PARTY | 1st Count | 8th Count | ELECTED |
| John Pender | Fianna Fáil | 1446 | — | 1st Count |
| Charlie Murphy | Independent | 1396 | — | 1st Count |
| Brian O’Donoghue | Fine Gael | 858 | — | 4th Count |
| William Paton | Labour | 782 | — | 4th Count |
| John Murphy | Fine Gael | 697 | — | 7th Count |
| Jim Deane | Sinn Féin | 561 | 795 | |
| John MacDonald | Fianna Fáil | 430 | 833 | 8th Count |
| Billy Nolan | Independent | 399 | — | |
| Maria Ansbro | Fine Gael | 369 | — | |
| Helena Byrne | Renua | 288 | — |
The first count saw the six outgoing Councillors placed take the first six positions with Jim Deane 131 votes ahead of John McDonald (FF). However, that advantage was entirely erased by the third count due to the distribution of Pender’s and Charlie Murphy’s surpluses. MacDonald took only 28% of his party colleague Pender’s surplus, but also took 16% of Murphy’s. Deane failed to take 10% of either.
Deane regained a slender lead with the elimination of the Renua candidate Helena Byrne, but again on the 7th count there was only 1 vote between them. The 8th and final count (the distribution of John Murphy’s surplus from ex-FG Independent Billy Nolan’s votes) saw MacDonald take 51 votes compared to only 12 for Deane and therefore take the final seat.
Looking at the parishes, Charlie Murphy dominated the south of the area, taking over two-thirds of the vote in Myshall and 58% to John MacDonald’s 18% in Clonegal. Over three-quarters of his surplus went to candidates based in the parishes to the South of Carlow town
The picture was more mixed in Ballon and Rathoe with the two Murphys, MacDonald and Nolan all taking roughly a fifth of the vote. MacDonald proved quite transfer-friendly taking at least 10% of the transfers in each of the six counts till he was elected.
In Tinryland, Deane took half the vote, while John MacDonald, Pender and John Murphy each took 10%. In the 2014 local election, Deane had taken the majority of his vote from Tinryland and Carlow town in 2014, which meant that the redraw of the boundaries had cut off much of his support base and left him in area where he was relatively unknown.
In the town of Tullow, Paton polled 30% to Pender’s 28% with Marie Ansbro of Fine Gael taking 13%. In the rural part of Tullow Parish Pender took 56% of the vote to 11% for Paton and 10% for John Murphy.
The North-western parishes were largely contested by Pender and O’Donoghue – O’Donoghue took 48% in Rathvilly 22% for Pender, while in Hackettstown and Clonmore Pender took around 40% to O’Donoghue’s 30%. Just under half of Pender’s surplus went back to candidates based in Tullow town and to the north of it.