Timeline for construction of new bridge over Shannon outlined

Work on a new bridge across the River Shannon as part of the next phase of the Dublin to Galway cycleway development could start in August or September, a top council official has indicated,

Director of Services Barry Kehoe gave the update at the conclusion of a presentation by the Manager of Athlone Arts and Tourism, Carmel Duffy, at a recent meeting of Athlone-Moate Municipal District.

The new bridge, which will bring the cycleway from Athlone Marina to Athlone Castle, will cross the Shannon from beside the Radisson Blu Hotel to close to the Luan Gallery.

Work on the cycleway section from the White Gates to Athlone Marina is expected to be completed later this summer.

Mr Kehoe also hinted at Monday's meeting about a possible future move for Athlone's tourist office from Athlone Castle as part of a suite of works planned for the area around the heritage site and visitor attraction over the next two years.

“The new bridge, the cycleway bridge, is in tender at the moment and we hope that contractor will start in August or September all going well so that's a fantastic milestone. Hopefully, that bridge will be completed at the end of 2022 or early 2023,” Mr Kehoe explained to members at the remotely held meeting.

“The flood defences are ongoing and we have some enhancement works to do between the castle and the river and then we have the Destination Towns Project. The regeneration project team will also be moving on with the enhancement of Market Square which again is a super opportunity to pull together all of the various initiatives, projects and attractions in that part of Athlone and to bring the church and other buildings into a very attractive public realm scheme.

“The next part of that will be to go up Connaught Street to put significant projects in place to make better use of the buildings on Connaught Street, particularly, the ones that we have acquired, of which there are quite a few,” he continued.

“So we'll putting a shape on that between now and the end of the year and hopefully we'll be back to members with proposals for those buildings, with a view then, to see how they might be put in place next year.”

Mr Kehoe agreed with members that there is a lot planned for the west side of Athlone, and he thanked Fáilte Ireland for their help and support with a number of commercialisation projects for Athlone Castle and work on the Hidden Heartlands brand since it came into being

He believes, Athlone, as the main town in the Hidden Heartlands area has a huge opportunity now, and “the challenge for us is to make the most of that and we're committed to it”.

On a possible tourism office move from Athlone Castle, he added: “That's been a longstanding objective and it's tied into the other projects particularly, the project to enhance the Market Square, and we'll be seeing if we can come up with something that will work for Fáilte Ireland and for ourselves in that regard. That's really my target for dealing with the issue of the tourist office and we'll keep you posted on that as we progress the design and as we engage with Fáilte Ireland”.