Cycling Ireland Welcome €7.5 Million Funding for City North Sports Arena

Cycling Ireland Welcome €7.5 Million Funding for City North Sports Arena

Cycling Ireland and Technical University of the Shannon (TUS) have welcomed confirmation by Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, Patrick O’Donovan, that the City North Arena project at Coonagh on the Northside of Limerick city is to receive €7.5 million in funding.  

The project will lead to the development of an 8,000 sq/m arena incorporating an indoor velodrome and facilities for various sports including basketball, badminton, volleyball and tennis as well as use cases such as exams and events. 

The funding is being made available under the Large Scale Sports Infrastructure Fund (LSSIF) and follows the signing of an MOU between Cycling Ireland and TUS and an accompanying funding application. The projected total cost of the project is €15.4 million, and the granting of LSSIF funding enables the project to progress to the next stage of development.  

Tom Daly, President of Cycling Ireland, said: “This is very welcome news and I congratulate TUS and all of the other partners which were involved in getting the project to this stage. I am very happy that Cycling Ireland’s partnership with TUS has been so fruitful and I am very much looking forward to this initiative greatly contributing to the further development of cycling in Ireland”.  

Professor Vincent Cunnane, President of TUS, welcomed the funding confirmation: “This is a major funding announcement for a project of international and national standing and of major significance for the Midwest region. City North Arena will be of direct benefit to Limerick and constitutes a major strategic element in the development of the northside of the city. 

“We are ready to embark on the next phase of this exciting development with our project partner, Cycling Ireland.”

 James Quilligan, Chief Executive Officer of Cycling Ireland, said: “Cycling Ireland operates across all cycling disciplines and is dedicated to promoting and developing the sport, and to developing new state-of-the-art facilities on the island of Ireland.

“We are excited that we can now move onto the next phase in the development of City North Arena, which will help develop the sport here and allow international athletes to train here.

“By providing a community-based facility with a 200m velodrome track, it will encourage participation in the sport and can act as a satellite feeder to the Sport Ireland Campus velodrome for events and the development of future representative cyclists.”

Jimmy Browne, Vice President of Campus Services and Capital Development at TUS, said: “We want to continue providing high quality facilities to help increase participation in sport, as well as providing quality facilities for the region in line with our Campus Masterplan. This will form the first part of our broader City North Sports Park at Coonagh.

“Limerick has transport infrastructure that makes it easily accessible to most of the country, together with the proximity to Shannon Airport, which makes Limerick an ideal location to also support plans for the national centre in Abbotstown.”