MINISTER OF STATE for Sport Thomas Byrne TD says there are “huge lessons to be learned” from the reuse of existing facilities at the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Paris.
While new facilities were built for Rio and Tokyo, Paris 2024 made a commitment to use existing infrastructures or set up temporary venues where possible. La Défense Arena, a multi-purpose venue developed by rugby club Racing 92, staged the swimming and water polo. Stade de France and Roland-Garros were among the other pre-existing venues.
The Aquatics Centre was one permanent purpose-built facility, with temporary arenas and stands erected at famous landmarks elsewhere.
“One thing I have to say about Paris that really impressed me at the Olympics was the venues,” said Minister Byrne at a joint Paralympics Ireland and Sport Ireland pre-Paralympic press conference on Tuesday.
“I mean they built one new venue. They reused lots of buildings.
“I do worry about all these plans that we get into the Department for these massive projects all around the country, and I think there’s huge scope to use existing facilities in a better way.
“It will be really interesting to see how the facilities work out for people with disabilities, but I have no doubt, based on what Paris has done up to now, that it will be absolutely first-class.
“It’s just wonderful to be around the city of Paris in this environment, seeing these old buildings and premises and landscapes being used for sport. I think there are huge lessons to be learned from that. We’ll see how the Paralympics work out but I have no doubt it will be just as good.”
“I want to wish all of our athletes the very best of luck. You’re doing yourself proud, you’re doing your families proud and I’ve no doubt you’ll do Ireland proud.”
— Paralympics Ireland (@ParalympicsIRE) August 20, 2024
We’re joined by Minister Byrne at the Sport Ireland Institute today for a briefing ahead of the Paralympic Games. pic.twitter.com/g9QNrJsA2n
Ireland is sending a 35-strong team to the Paralympic Games, which get underway next week. 29 athletes and six pilots will compete across nine sports, with competition starting on Thursday 29 August.
Minister Byrne — who is due to travel to the Games — noted that Sport Ireland will have invested over €8 million in Paralympics Ireland throughout the Paris cycle 2021-2024.
This is a 21% increase on the Tokyo cycle, and includes €3.7m in dedicated high performance sport funding (36% increase), €1.3m in direct athlete support, and €800,000 specifically on the Games.
Ahead of Budget 2024, Minister Byrne pledged his “dedication to seeing funding for disability sporting initiatives secured and enhanced”.
He also paid tribute to the late Anne Ebbs in his address. Ebbs, who founded the Paralympic Council of Ireland in 1987 and was a three-time Paralympic medal winner in table tennis, died in February. She hailed from Minister Byrne’s locality in Meath.
Plenty unused handball alleys out there.
Absolute waffle. We have very very few facilities
No idea what this clown is talking about, we don’t have any existing sports facilities, bar GAA stadiums and some third world League of Ireland grounds, none of which are worth a damn for anything other than their chosen sports. If by some miracle Ireland was ever to get awarded the Olympics, we would need to build brand new stadiums and arenas for all of the different sports, so what he is saying makes no sense whatsoever.
@The Firestarter: . We will never be awarded the Olympics.
What facilities exactly?? Can’t use GAA stadiums for anything other than GAA. Typical politician waffle for saying, we wont fund any other sports facilities. Not a surprise unfortunately