The Taoiseach sees the National Aquatic Centre as part of a bigger picture, writes Frank McDonald
Not much more than two years from planning permission to completion, the National Aquatic Centre at Abbotstown, Co Dublin, was officially opened yesterday to widespread acclaim - not least from the Taoiseach, who still sees it as the first piece of a much larger sporting jigsaw.
The real irony is that an aquatic centre did not form part of the original Sports Campus Ireland project. It was only added to the national stadium, colloquially known as the "Bertie Bowl", and other sports facilities planned for the 500-acre site in July 2000 with a view to the Special Olympics in June.
Yet if the worst comes to the worst, and the Taoiseach's dream is dashed, it may end up as the only sports venue to be built at Abbotstown.
Much will depend on the efforts being made by the Minister for Sport, Mr O'Donoghue, to get agreement from the FAI and IRFU on the stadium project.
"No way will it be the last thing built," Mr Ahern said yesterday when he was door-stepped on this issue by The Irish Times.
Asked if it would not make more sense to develop the site for housing, he replied: "I think it would be totally wrong use of the area to put housing on it. I can never see housing on it."
Later, faced with a small forest of microphones, it was put to him that the stadium might not materialise.
"Minister O'Donoghue is working on that project very capably and he'll be reporting back to Government in a few months' time."
But would it be at Abbotstown?
"We'll see", he said. "I don't want to prejudge my colleague."
Asked if the national sports centre had become more of a nightmare than a dream, the Taoiseach said: "Everything is a dream. I know there were people who said we would never see anything on this site, ever, other than cattle. We've moved a little bit away from that, though cattle are very important as well."
He also denied claims that the site was relatively inaccessible, particularly from the heart of Dublin.
Yesterday morning it had only taken him 16 minutes to travel by car from the city-centre to the nearest roundabout on the N3 at Blanchardstown, "without using of the bus lanes or speeding".
The Taoiseach was careful to add that he was "not saying you would do that in heavy traffic".
And though he claimed in his speech that there was "excellent access by road and rail", he later admitted that he was not aware that there was a problem with public transport; the nearest bus stop is almost half-a-mile away.
He pointed to the "enormous population" of at least 70,000 in the immediate Blanchardstown area, plus another 50,000 in Cabra and Finglas, and the plans to build up to 6,000 more houses in nearby Pelletstown and at the Phoenix Park racecourse site. All of these would be within easy reach of Abbotstown.
Quite apart from the "state-of-the-art" Olympic-sized pool, which is "the best in Europe", Mr Ahern said the "nice thing" about the National Aquatic Centre was that it had superb leisure facilities which could be used by young and old alike.
ISME, the business organisation, yesterday cited the project as "an example of what can be done with proper planning, efficiency and private enterprise involvement", contrasting it to the "shambles" of the National Development Plan, which had left Ireland with an infrastructure "which would not be out of place in Outer Mongolia".
However, when the €62 million project was approved, it was anticipated that a substantial portion of the funding - more than 50 per cent by the most optimistic estimate - would come from the private sector.
In fact, the private sector contribution from Dublin Waterworld amounted to just 1 per cent of the overall cost.
It had also been assumed that a large proportion of the funding for the national stadium and other elements of Sports Campus Ireland would come from the private sector. But when this was put to the test last year, there were too many strings attached.
The truth is that the entire project, conceived at the height of the "Celtic Tiger" boom, is no longer affordable. According to the Government's independent consultants, it would expose the Exchequer to the tune of €891 million and, as a result, the rest of it must now be regarded as a dead duck.