Decision soon on site for Abbey

A decision is finally expected next week on the new location for the Abbey Theatre. The Minister for Tourism, Mr O'Donoghue, told the Dáil yesterday that he would bring the OPW recommendation on the site to the Cabinet in the next week or so.

He said that he would honour his commitment to announce the site before the end of this centenary year of the national theatre. The Abbey will be kept open until development work is completed.

Parnell Square is the current favourite location, on the site where the Coláiste Mhuire secondary school stood.

However, the Minister said that, out of courtesy to his Cabinet colleagues, he could not comment further in advance of a Government decision.

Mr O'Donoghue could not give a date for the start of development work because this would require much planning. "No funding has been provided in the Estimates for 2005 for the construction of a new theatre," he said. "I would be astounded if Deputy Cowen was to surprise me this afternoon in the Budget regarding this." The Minister has already allocated €2 million to help the Abbey Theatre deal with its financial difficulties.

Mr O'Donoghue said: "Despite the fact that this is one of the most creative and imaginative generations of Irish people, there is no signature building giving expression to that creativity and imagination.

"Therefore, the new theatre is of pivotal importance, not just in terms of the continuation of the Abbey, but of giving expression through public architecture of that creativity and imagination to realise the ambition of providing the people with a new national theatre."

Fine Gael's arts spokesman, Mr Jimmy Deenihan, welcomed the Minister's "historic and important announcement" and expressed his hope that the Coláiste Mhuire site would be chosen. "The Dublin Writers' Museum and the Hugh Lane Gallery are located in Parnell Square and the Gate Theatre is nearby. There would be a synergy between both the visual and the performing arts."

In the long-running saga over the redevelopment of the Abbey, the plans for the existing Abbey Street site were abandoned because of the legal difficulties and costs involved in acquiring adjacent sites to extend the theatre to an optimum size. The OPW had advised that it would cost about €50 million to "acquire a sufficient footprint on the present site of the Abbey".

The former Carlton cinema on O'Connell Street at one stage looked like the best option for the redeveloped theatre, but legal proceedings over a compulsory purchase order by Dublin City Council apparently ruled it out.