Remembering 1916: Coalition signals seven projects to be ready

The seven multimillion euro projects that will become "permanent reminders" of the 1916 Easter Rising will all be completed in time for next year's centenary , the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht has promised.

In briefing material supplied to The Irish Times, the department has said the seven projects, which have capital funding of €22 million, will all be completed in 2016, with only two opening to the public after the Rising date.

Six of the projects are in Dublin. The seventh is Teach an Phiarsaigh in Ros Muc, Co Galway, which was Patrick Pearse's holiday cottage.

Minister for Arts and Heritage Heather Humphreys is confident that the projects' permanence will underpin the significance of next year's events.

“These seven projects will leave us with a lasting legacy from the 2016 commemorations,” she said. “Each project has the potential to attract a high number of visitors. The GPO interpretive centre alone is expected to attract 300,000 visitors a year.”

The centrepiece is the GPO Witness History project in O’Connell Street. It will feature a new interpretive centre and will show the GPO’s role in the history of the foundation of the State. The centre will house a permanent 1916 exhibition.

The project is scheduled to be completed early next year. According to the department, the “construction is on target and all critical milestones have been met. Exhibition development is also on target.”

Shannon Heritage, which operates Bunratty and Malahide Castle, has been appointed to operate the facility when it opens.

Culture centre

The Teach an Phiarsaigh project in Galway will be among the later to finish, and is expected to be open by next summer.

With a €4 million budget, the project – which is being overseen by Údarás na Gaeltachta – entails developing a culture centre and an experimental introduction to the Irish language.

There will also be material on Pearse and his relationship with Ros Muc and the Gaeltacht.

A project management team has been appointed, an economic appraisal of the project has been completed and the vesting process to procure the land will be finished later in the month.

The third project, in Richmond Barracks in Dublin, involves the restoration of the buildings where the 1916 leaders were interned and court- martialled. It will also feature an interpretative space.

Planning has been applied for but not completed and a design team will soon be in place. It is envisaged that the centre will open on May 2nd, 2016, the centenary of the first court martial hearings which took place there.

Another project in the capital's city centre is the €6 million refurbishment of the historic Kevin Barry Rooms, and other works, at the National Concert Hall.

These were the rooms which were the setting of the Treaty ratification debates of the second Dáil. A new performance, recital and practice room will be completed along with ancillary facilities.

Acoustic plans

According to chief executive

Simon Taylor

, the Office of Public Works has completed the architectural and acoustic plans and the project has gone to planning permission.

Mr Taylor said it was anticipated that contractors would start work in July or August and the project would be finished next year.

The 14 Henrietta Street project will entail conservation of a historic house in the north inner city to show what tenement and Georgian life was like in Dublin.

A design team has been appointed and planning permission will be applied for later this month.

The project includes a digital exhibition as well as an oral history project called “urban memories and tenement experiences”.

The works will be completed during 2016.

Another major project is the Kilmainham courthouse visitor centre which the OPW is overseeing. This is where the 1916 leaders were executed. It includes upgrading the gaol museum and refurbishing the adjacent courthouse as a visitor centre.

The OPW says that planning process for the courthouse has been completed and construction will start next month. It is due to open in early 2016.