ITT SPORTS ACADEMY GOING OUT TO TENDER

THE tendering process for the construction of the planned sports academy at IT Tralee is due to get underway next month.

The €15 million facility will take around 18 months to construct with the project expected to create around 120 construction jobs.

ITT’s Sports Academy will be a centre of excellence in sport built on the grounds of the college’s north campus in Dromthacker and it will provide a facility which will be used by students and the Kerry county football and hurling teams.

It will also cater for rugby and other sports.

Once complete the centre will be a home for ITT’s health and leisure programmes and act as a headquarters for the college’s UNESCO Chair of Inclusive Physical Education and the Kerry branch of Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann.

The development of the academy will be one of the largest construction project undertaken in the entire institute of technology sector since the economic crash and the onset of the recession.

Design costs for the project were €339,000 which accounts for about 2.25 per cent of the academy’s development budget.

The project – a joint enterprise by IT Tralee and the Kerry GAA – has received €7 million in capital funding from the Government. Billionaire JP McManus’s Benevolent Fund has also donated over €1 million to the project.

The remaining funds for the development of the Academy have been raised by the ITT Foundation Board a body set up in 2014 to assist with fundraising for the future development of the college.

The board includes former Tánaiste Dick Spring, Kerry Group CEO Stan McCarthy and broadcaster Micheál Ó Muircheartaigh.