Pairc De Burca Development Update

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Last Monday was another major milestone along the road to complete the development of the upgrade works on our home pitch Pairc de Burca in Glenalbyn. Members will know that the project is a generational one, targeted at increasing the size of the playing surface to championship standard, improving the draining and irrigation and installing flood lights.  Last Monday, the lights were switched on for testing and configuration.  This was a major progress milestone in the overall program.  Because of some engineering challenges at the cinema end of the pitch, some construction milestone delays and supply chain issues which unfortunately have become all to familiar at the moment due to the pandemic,  the original target of returning the pitch for use going into the 4th quarter of the year will not now be achieved. The engineering challenges have finally been resolved and work to implement the solution is going to happen over the next four (approx.) weeks. In addition the ground work to sand and restore the entire surface will take place in the next week or two.

While all of  that is good news we are, as a result of the delays we have experienced,  in the hands of the weather  to give us grass growth. If we get a good October we will make real progress on that front but if, as is more likely, growth in October is poor we may be facing a wait until the early part of next year before we finish the project out.

Whilst this is  disappointing, it is more important to get this major development completed properly to set us up for the future rather than to rush our fences by returning to play on the pitch too soon. In that context it is critical that members / players / local messers and trespassers stay off the pitch and we ask all members to do two things : (1) please stay off the pitch for any reason including jogging around the perimeter, and (b) immediately report to the office or to any committee member any occasion when you see anybody other than an obvious worker / contractor on the pitch.

The pitch coordinators from each section will continue to work their magic to allocate pitch resources for training and games whilst Pairc De Burca remains offline.  As the project progresses, we will provide further member updates.

Kilmacud Crokes Club Executive

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