Monday, August 22, 2011

Tuam parish centre gets go-ahead

A €2.5m parish centre proposed for Tuam in County Galway has been given the green light.

Galway County Council has given planning permission for the proposed development on a site between the town’s cathedral and the Mercy convent.

Fr Stephen Farragher, who as administrator of the parish for several years until last month was responsible for spearheading the plan, said the centre would provide a much-needed resource, as the existing parish centre on the Dublin Road is too small.

He said that the parish cannot cope with demand for the use of rooms and offices and had to rent rooms in hotels for large diocesan gatherings, which have become more common as lay involvement in the affairs of the archdiocese increases.  

The fact that the parish has up to a hundred children being prepared for first communion every year and that it is now part of a cluster of parishes whose parish councils need to meet regularly are two of the factors that have made the present facilities inadequate.

The parish centre will incorporate an existing coach-house that will be used as an exhibition space and museum for chalices and other artefacts related to the archdiocese.

The day chapel will be open until 10:00pm each evening and will contain stained glass windows, which were removed from a chapel in a disused hospital.

The initial design for the centre was modified in response to issues raised by planning officials who were uneasy with the parish architects’ first designs.  

The parish had initially envisaged a two-storey building but will now be part single storey with a single-level chapel and foyer in the front and a two-storey section at the back to accommodate a hall and meeting rooms.

The council officials sought what they termed a design that would be more sensitive in architectural terms to the ecclesiastical complex in which will be built. 

The planners are understood to have attached seven conditions to the development, including a requirement for an archaeological assessment of the site before building gets under way.

Apart from serving parish and diocese needs, there are hopes that the museum exhibition in the centre will become a focus for visitors to the town and Fr Farragher said the centre would give people a sense of the past and the future.

“The building has been designed for the parish of the future while being mindful and reminiscent of its past and heritage,” he explained.

Fr Farragher said that €1m had already been accumulated towards the cost of the project but that considerable fund-raising would still be necessary.

With his transfer to become PP of Ballyhaunis announced in last month’s reshuffle of Tuam clergy, the task of seeing the project to completion falls to his successor, Fr Francis Mitchell.