CAMPUS AND STADIUM IRELAND DEVELOPMENT: A proposal from the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, John O'Donoghue to allocate some €120 million for the development of phase one of the Campus and Stadium Ireland Development (CSID) is likely to go before Cabinet on the January 27th with the project's chief executive, Donagh Morgan, predicting approval would mean construction work commencing on the scheme within 12 months.
Phase one is intended to involve the development of around one third of the 500-acre site at Abbotstown with high specification facilities being provided for the FAI, GAA, IRFU and around 30 other organisations.
If approved, the three biggest field sports organisations will be the greatest beneficiaries of the move. Each will be provided with a mix of grass and synthetic outdoor pitches, a significant proportion of which will be floodlit while the FAI and IRFU will also have covered synthetic international training pitches of the type used by their French counterparts at Clarefontaine and Marcoussis, respectively. Hockey pitches will also be provided and a major sports centre will provide facilities for around 30 indoor sports.
In addition, there will be extensive shared medical, fitness, meeting and coaching facilities as well as living accommodation which would allow squads from a range of sports organisations to stay on site during extended training sessions.
"What is envisaged is a very wide ranging development," said Morgan yesterday. "There is a focus on the elite facilities but we have allowed for a whole range of other things. There will be grass and seven-a-side synthetic pitches that will be available for use by members of the local community and anybody else that wants to use them."
Although national sports organisations and their leading athletes will receive priority at the centre it is envisaged a significant number of clubs could operate out of it when phase one is completed in, it is estimated, five years' time.
The Government funding would be provided over the course of that time with between €20 and €25 million being spent each year. It is anticipated the planning and design stage would take under a year to complete and no significant objections are anticipated from the local community which will benefit from the landscaping of extensive parkland at the site.
The possibility of converting the current state laboratory buildings on the campus into office accommodation for sports organisations, rather than demolishing them and constructing from scratch, is also being examined with the FAI having apparently expressed a firm interest in moving its headquarters into the first of the major buildings due to be vacated during the coming year.
"Many of the buildings contain significant amounts of office space as it is but a great deal of the laboratory space is also quite suitable for conversion into offices and that's something that we've been looking at," said Morgan. "The FAI are certainly interested but the IRFU and GAA have also flagged an interest in taking office space on the campus and I could see a situation in which all three had an administrative presence here within a couple of years."
The hope is the first of the sports facilities might be operational within three to four years with the rest completed in the fifth. Beyond that a wide range of developments are being considered for the next phase although Morgan insists nothing has been considered in any detail at this point.
"It's a huge site and there are a great many ideas as to how we might develop it. All three of the big field organisations have said they'd like to see a small stadium with between 10,000 and 20,000 seats out here while Cycling Ireland is very keen on the development of a velodrome. There's no shortage of possibilities although we have to make sure that whatever we seek to develop is really viable because there would be nothing worse than to spend large sums of money on facilities that weren't used.
"That's for the future, through. The overall development is sure to go on not just for the next five years but for the next 10 or 15 or 20 and at this stage we are simply waiting to see whether the Government gives the go ahead for phase one."
FAI technical director Packie Bonner yesterday welcomed the prospect of an early decision on the funding, observing it would provide a greatly needed degree of certainty to the association's planning for the future. "This is a huge development for us. If it happens it has the potential to set not just us but also the IRFU, the GAA and a considerable number of other associations up.
"For us it's particularly important given where we're coming from at a time when we are looking to implement our technical plan. Just to get the structures required for that in place we need to expand our staff but don't currently have the space to do it and then there are matters like the education and training of coaches and our work with elite squads. No matter what area we look to make progress in at present we seem to have to beg, borrow and steal to get things done. What's envisaged is tremendously positive while there's also a measure of flexibility there to allow for what is identified as a requirement in the future. If the funding is approved this month it would represent a great boost to our plans for the future."
Proposals for this initial phase were put together after the Government decided to press ahead with the development of a sports campus at Abbotstown at the start of last year when it was decided to rebuild Lansdowne Road rather than fund a national stadium. CSID management drew up a development control plan after talks with national sports organisations and following a report by consultants Davis Langdon PKS. Corresponding centres in other countries were also looked at.
The hope now is approval will be given for the funding this month although another source close to the project said yesterday it is possible a final decision may not be made until February.
