Military Barracks needs clean-up

Nenagh Municipal District councillors have again called on the Department of Defence to clean up the site of the Military Barracks in the town and to commission a survey to see if the historic building can be restored to its former glory.

Raising the matter at the April meeting of the district authority, Cllr Seamus Morris said the site was overgrown and vegetation was now growing over walls into adjoining estates and private properties. The site had become a blackspot for dumping.

Cllr Michael O’Meara said the site was a very historic one and he would like to see the buildings on it restored. “The barracks could be a spectacular building for Nenagh. I know financially it would be a big job, but I think we should look into it.”

Cllr Rocky McGrath said the council should try to come to some agreement with the Department to restore the buildings on the site. “This could make an absolutely wonderful tourist attraction.”

Cllr Morris said asking the council to take over the buildings and restore them itself would be reckless.

“The council don’t have the huge financial resources that would be needed to do up the barracks.”

He suggested making representations to Deputy Michael Lowry as he supported the current government and might be in a position to progress matters in terms of the future of the site.

A survey commissioned many years ago on the barracks had concluded that there was just a window of a decade remaining before the building would go beyond repair. Another survey needed to be conducted before the Department put the site up for sale.

It would be fantastic to restore the barracks and new survey would give an indication of the costs involved, said Cllr Morris.

District Administrator Rosemary Joyce said she would make contact with the Department about the need to tackle overgrown vegetation and dumping on the site. A registration of title had been completed by the Department showing exactly the property it owned and what it had responsibility for. She said the property was registered in the name of the Minister of Public Expenditure and Reform.

Cllr Joe Hannigan said it was “a complicated site” because Eir and the Department of Social Welfare owned some of the property.

Ms Joyce said there was no way the council could just step in and take over a site that had become “a poison chalice” due to the huge amount of funding now required to restore the buildings after decades of neglect, which was not of the local authority’s making.