New civic space to boost tourism and drive success of area

A multimillion euro cultural quarter is to be established in Sligo with the first phase to include a new €14 million museum and a €7 million extension to a local landmark centre for the arts, the Model Arts and Niland Gallery.

The second phase, which is expected to cost €100 million, will see a civic space incorporating an outdoor amphitheatre constructed on an adjoining three-acre site along with retail and residential developments and 800 car parking spaces.

The quarter will be linked to the city and the river through pedestrian walkways.

Project director Bartley Gavin said work will start on the first phase in November with the new Sligo Museum and the extended Niland Gallery expected to open by autumn 2009. Planning permission was granted last year.

"We expect the development of cultural facilities to be a driving force in the success of the city," said Mr Gavin. He said the project was expected to boost Sligo's reputation as a cultural tourism destination but was also designed to improve facilities for local people in a region steeped in archaeological treasures and culture.

Work on the second phase which will be built as a public private partnership, is expected to begin in mid-2009.

The new two-storey museum is to be located between the Mall and Connaughton Road on a site behind the Niland Gallery, currently occupied by a 340-space car park. A new library building is also planned for the Mall and Mr Gavin said that a "cultural corridor" will link the museum, gallery, and library to the Yeats building in the city.

A €3 million allocation for the museum has already been received from the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism under the Access 1 scheme and a further allocation under Access 2 is now expected. It is also hoped to raise funding through the National Development Plan given its emphasis on developing cultural facilities in gateway cities. Sligo County Council and Borough Council who are spearheading the project in co-operation with the Niland Gallery said the museum would be a landmark building overlooking the city and harbour, close to a listed monument, known as the Green Fort.

The existing county museum houses a range of Yeats memorabilia including the writer's Nobel prize medal. It was presented by Senator Michael Yeats in recognition of his father's close ties with Sligo.

Mr Gavin said that the new museum which will have a floor space of 2,500sq m will house both temporary and permanent exhibitions with the facilities to include a lecture hall, education rooms, a conservation suite, cataloguing area, a restaurant/café and a workshop/isolation room.

"We expect to work closely with the archaeological department in Sligo institute of Technology," said Mr Gavin. "We have also had discussions with the National Museum and hope that the new museum will be of national as well as regional significance."

The refurbishment and extension to the Niland Gallery, a former model school built in the 1850s, will provide improved gallery space, a new blackbox performance area and eight artists' studios.