Tubberclair group working to meet community's future needs

Creating a strong community for future generations, and allowing people to connect and avail of facilities in their locality, is what motivates the committee members of the Tubberclair Local Action Group.

Established in February 2024, the group aims to improve the quality of life of residents of Glasson, Tubberclair and Ballykeeran, as well as improving the visitor experience to the area.

The Glasson/Tubberclair Community Group had been established the previous summer by a group of parents who recognised that unless their children played GAA, there was nowhere for them to go.

The group was making inroads in improving community connections with a variety of events aimed at all ages and cohorts, but one local - Jackie Dunning - recognised that there was a gap in the infrastructure to meet the needs of the community and the Tubberclair Local Action Group was established to tackle this.

The group recruited members of other groups and associations in the locality to ensure there was a broad representation.

Although only in its infancy, the Tubberclair Local Action Group has been extremely proactive in the past 15 months and has created a Community Development Plan based on over 400 responses from local residents and businesses.

This will form the blueprint for any future development in the community, the group hopes, as it is based on what the community members themselves want to see in the Glasson / Tubberclair / Ballykeeran area.

The group has also commissioned a feasibility study on a community hall, with the assistance of LEADER funding and local contributions, and this is expected to be complete shortly and will identify a preferred site for a community centre.

Secretary of the group, Jackie Dunning, said: "The first thing our committee did was to do a parish wide survey. We went to the ends of the earth to get this survey.

"We did a digital survey with QR codes printed around the place. I think there were 40 groups that we sent it out to, and then we did a physical one and we left that at the post office.

"We went to the primary school and we did a children's survey. We went to the secondary schools and did a survey through them, got all the teenagers to add to it, and we also did a disability survey.

"If you were to go by households, we got about an 80% response, so it was a significant response. It's hard to determine an exact percent, but from the latest Census there are about 600 houses here and we got over 400 responses."

Committee member Siobhan McCormack, who spearheaded the creation of the development plan, explained: "We really wanted this to be the voice of the community, not just what we felt was needed.

"Every time there was a question about what should we prioritise, or what should we do, we'd come back and say, 'What did the survey say, what did the community say?'

"It expanded as we got through it. It covered the history of the area. We did a piece on the current state of the village. An accessibility survey was done. That was led by the Irish Wheelchair Association, they helped to set that up," said Siobhan.

"We saw that we had a clear need for infrastructural improvements, active travel and accessibility, and then engagement with community. Coming out of that we had quite a few priorities so we narrowed it down and the main ones we wanted to focus on were a path between Tubberclair and Glasson along the N55, a playground, and community centre."

Rural Isolation

"The survey itself would have broken your heart because a lot of the early feedback was around isolation, not being able to meet anyone," said Jackie.

Not being able to walk from their houses, or being new to the area and not knowing people, were some of the other issues raised by the community.

Treasurer Joan Fallon added: "If you're not in the school or involved in the GAA, where do you meet people?"

Joan is also a member of the Glasson/Tubberclair Community Group and explained that some of the events it has organised have really helped to bring people together. These have included a 5k run, fortnightly summer movie nights for the children, Christmas carols, Halloween events, an Easter event, and book swaps.

Another positive to come from the survey was the establishment of a parent and toddler group following comments from new mothers who felt there was nowhere for them to go.

"We spun up a parent and toddler group within a month, and we meet now every week," explained Siobhan.

PRO Anna Connaughton said: "We don't want it to become a commuter village where people are just living here and there is nothing for them.

"Since the group has started, there seems to be a little more bonding with people.... With the events we've had, you see different faces at every event."

Community Centre Goal

The group adds that - if it had a community centre - it would be able to organise a lot more events. Feedback from the school suggests that if there was a community centre that it could access, it would have a daily use for it.

"A community centre costs a lot of money and we don't have any money. You have to go for a grant, and this grant isn't available at the moment, so you have to wait for it and you have to have all these ducks in a row, so this is a five-year plan, at a minimum," explained Jackie.

The committee is made up of 17 people, with a number of others volunteering their skills to assist in getting some projects off the ground. The group says it has been met with great positivity across the community in relation to the projects it has planned.

Aside from a community centre, one of the key projects the group aims to tackle is the installation of a footpath between Tubberclair and Glasson.

"If you look at Glasson, there are five roads leading out of this village and not one of them has a footpath," said Jackie. "We have a roads traffic engineer who lives locally who was able to do up a design of the village and show that a footpath either side of the village is achievable."

She added a footpath was a major priority for respondents to their survey, but said the fact that it would be along the N55 - a national primary road - had created an obstacle because it falls under the remit of the TII, rather than the council, which makes it difficult to get traction on.

However, the fact that they have a design ready to go gives the group some hope in this regard.

"The realignment of the N55 has hindered development. However we go forward and whatever we do we will try and align with the preferred route for it, but it has to connect the communities of Glasson to the school, the church, the GAA pitch," explained Jackie.

The fact that the area is located on a busy national road, with heavy goods vehicles regularly travelling along it, raised concerns surrounding speed, and another priority for the Action Group is the installation of traffic calming measures and also the need for a carpark in the village of Glasson.

"This is a main artery to the north and you've a lot of big vehicles coming through the village," said Siobhan. "There's a need for traffic calming in general, and a carpark to take cars off footpaths in the village."

The group has met with Westmeath County Council chief executive Barry Kehoe regarding a number of issues, as well as Minister of State Kevin 'Boxer' Moran and councillors Frankie Keena and John Dolan, and has received positive support.

"Frankie Keena has been holding our hand throughout the whole thing, he's been great," said Jackie.

Anna added that Westmeath County Council is its partner on this and she has received great support from different staff of the local authority at numerous events to point her in the right direction.

Anna is the group's PRO but is also responsible for grant applications. She said the group was somewhat naive at first and thought it was simply a matter of asking the council for money and receiving it, not realising that the council may not have the resources.

"There was that assumption at the start that if we just asked it would happen and it became very clear, very quickly, that actually you have to do it all, you have to develop it, you have to show your need for it," added Jackie.

"If you don't do anything, you don't get anything. If you sit back and wait for a playground to happen, it's not going to happen. There's no saviour, no champion that's going to stand up and do it for us," said Siobhan.

And it's clear that this is something the group quickly took on board, taking a very proactive approach in laying the foundations for the development of the community in line with the needs of the community members.

"It was really important to us when we did the development plan that it wasn't just done by eight or nine people, that it was the whole community," explained Jackie.

She added that there has been huge support from local businesses and residents. The group has received a generous donation from a local business family, and when it needed to raise money for the feasibility study for the hall, which was 90% LEADER-funded, it managed to raise the remaining €6,000 required through an online iDonate page in just two days.

The next step for the group is to now present its 80-page community development plan to the executive of Westmeath County Council, having already received feedback from members of the community and local public representatives.

"Hopefully we will be able to use it as the foundation for any grants and submissions that we make," said Jackie.

"We have an application in for the Town and Village Renewal Scheme, the Outdoor Recreation Infrastructure Scheme and Clár, which are all significant grants.

"With all of our plans we want to take into consideration the whole community," she concluded.