How does the author describe Tara Road in the novel, Tara Road?

From the text:

"Tara Road was very higgledy-piggledy. Big houses with gardens full of trees, small houses facing right on the street. No. 16 was a great old house, Danny said. Falling down, damp, shabby now. Poor Sean O'Brien's uncle must have been a bit of a no-hoper like Sean himself, it must have been a great house once."