Sport for Business will be live this morning from 11am at the National Sports Campus in Blanchardstown as Minister Paschal Donohoe and Joan Burton turn the sod on the new National Indoor Arena.
We will broadcast the event on Periscope and Twitter and hope that you will be able to join us to witness the latest major step forward for the Campus and for sport in Ireland.
The Arena will include a 200 metre indoor athletics track, 60 metre and 110 metre sprint tracks, throw, jump and pole vault areas and permanent seating for 400 spectators with the capacity to increase this to 1,900 for key events at national or international level.
There will also be a national indoor training centre catering for over 20 different sports in a variety of configurations. This will be capable of sub division into three separate areas and will also have a seating capacity for 1,500 spectators.
The third element of the Indoor Arena will be a National Gymnastics Training Centre catering for all gymnastics disciplines.
These first three phases will be complete in November 2016 and will then be followed by the second phase which will include the completion of covered synthetic pitches aimed primarily at soccer and rugby and providing a year round facility for major field sports with all the necessary ancillary facilities.
The Arena is an ambitious project and part of the ongoing master plan for the campus which includes the Irish Institute of Sport High Performance Centre already under construction and scheduled for completion in August 2015.
The Campus Pavilion Building will provide changing room, meeting and conference facilities and is due to complete at the same time.
Sport for Business wrote last week about the new National Velodrome and Badminton Centre which is currently in the planning stage and the new headquarters for Special Olympics Ireland will also start work very shortly to complete next year.
The National Sports Campus and the Irish Sports Council are among more than 120 organisations that are full members of our Sport for Business network of leaders. Find out how we can help your organisation build business through sport
