Let There Be No Rock

La Touche Road Car Park yesterday. Around 5.20pm.

s a local group of artists campaign for an indoor arts centre, plans for an outdoor performance space have been KO’d.

Back in November 2023, Wicklow County Council were awarded a  grant of €250,000 from the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht Sport and Media and the La Touche Road car park was promptly chosen as the location.

The NOV19 Public Realm mock-up

This outdoor performance space (behind the train station, geography fans) was first suggested by the 2020 Public Realm plans that have largely been ignored by the Greystones Municipal District Office for the past four years.

Which got us to thinking – have they been ignoring the €250,000 grant for our own little Woodstock too? So, we contacted Greystones Municipal District Office. They told us to talk to Wicklow County Council. And today, they filled us in on what happened to Greystones’ shiny new outdoor performance space….

There was the beginnings of a plan for an outdoor performance space at the La Touche Rd car park. This was central government funding made available during the later stages of the Pandemic for the use of public realm for outdoor performance.

This funding was originally earmarked for a project in Bray. When the Bray project did not go ahead, it was decided to investigate using the funding for an outdoor performance space in Greystones.

The timescale for spending the money was very challenging. The project went as far as to get architectural design concepts, site investigations and environmental assessments. As the project was being scoped it became apparent there were issues to be resolved, for example, the presence of the remnants of the turntable that was part of Greystones Train Station.

The project did not proceed as there was not time to resolve those issues.

That space is still being considered for enhancement as a public space, and will be considered by the Municipal District for future funding streams.

Dang. Back to square none. And at a time when this sleepy town needs a good kick up the arts too.