Work on Carlow’s Water Activity Centre is set to begin in the fourth quarter of this year, Town Councillors were informed during their January meeting.
Planning permission for the Graiguecullen-based centre was secured in 2022, with €4.2 million allocated to the project by the Department of Tourism in November 2024.
Speaking to KCLR News, Mayor of Carlow Paul Doogue welcomed the development’s advancement, which he described as “long overdue”.
“This new centre will be ideally located and will permit greater use and accessibility to the River Barrow. We’re really looking forward to its delivery as it will bring a whole new community of water sports enthusiasts into Carlow and will also be multifunctional, available to all disciplines and will also cater for meetings.”
Briefing Councillors on the project, Senior Executive Officer (SEO) Barry Knowles said it had progressed through “numerous gateways” with the Department of Tourism with the next step, a financial assessment, to be finalised by the Council at the end of this month.
Mr Knowles added: “All going well, I envisage that we will have a consultant appointed to bring it to handover stage and we could be going to construction on this with a contractor appointed by Q4 2026.”
Plans for such a project were first mooted in 2019. According to the subsequent planning report prepared by Kenneth Hennessy Architects on behalf of Carlow County Council (2021), the development aims to “revitalise the area and create a water-based activity and community centre for both local residents and tourists to the area”.
The centre will house both the community building and café. “This is one and half storey in height facing onto the river with an outdoor terrace and covered seating area. It has a mono-pitch roof raking upward to maximise river views and admit sunlight,” the report states.
The ancillary spaces associated with the café will be to the rear to the centre. This will open directly onto “the outdoor space facilitating the sale of take away refreshments from beneath the canopy”.
A lightweight steel and polycarbonate canopy will provide shelter to users sitting outdoors to dine or queuing for take away refreshments. “It ties together the two buildings running parallel to the river’s edge and defines the public seating area which rakes towards the Bachelor’s Walk creating a new connection to the river’s edge.”
The facilities building will form “the counterpart of the community/café building bookending the central space”.
It will feature:
- Changing/shower/toilet facilities including an accessible suite and covered outdoor shower facilities at ground floor level
- A small storage locker within the ground floor of this unit for the Council’s Parks Department
- A first floor dedicated for sports/recreation/training and community use, along with an additional storage area.
- A Technical Guidance Document M (TGC) compliant stair and lift and
- “Social enterprise units facing onto the public realm space” .
Mayor Doogue added: “Historically, Graiguecullen has been considered on the periphery of Carlow Town – is it in Carlow, is it in Laois, is it in ‘No Man’s Land’ – but this will imprint the area on the map in a definitive way and will attract many people into our town who may not have considered visiting our town previously. When you consider that there isn’t an equivalent facility north of us in Kildare or to the south in Kilkenny, this centre will be a tremendous draw and we’re all looking forward to seeing it constructed, opened and in full operation.”
The centre is a core objective of the Carlow County Development Plan (2022–2028), according to the County Council, “creating a water-based activity hub that will serve as a dynamic community and tourism asset for the region. The site was also identified as an opportunity for development in ‘Project Carlow 2040 – A vision for Regeneration’.”
According to Carlow County Council Chief Executive Coilín O’Reilly, the centre “aligns with our long-term vision of a connected, thriving town, where urban regeneration and community wellbeing go hand in hand.”
