Written answers

Wednesday, 17 April 2019

Department of Public Expenditure and Reform

National Monuments

Photo of Lisa ChambersLisa Chambers (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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103. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform his plans for a site (details supplied); when it will be operational; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17904/19]

Photo of Kevin  MoranKevin Moran (Longford-Westmeath, Independent)
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Bunadober Mill (also known as Moran's Mill) is a National Monument in State care since 1996 and responsibility for its maintenance and protection falls to the Office of Public Works.The Mill is a surviving example of vernacular rural industrial heritage which contains a particularly notable horizontal mill wheel and other historically-important mill machinery.

The strategic aim is to conserve and protect the mill complex in its current form and to allow for the future presentation of the site to the visiting public.To this end, the OPW has been undertaking a careful conservation project at the site to address a number of issues sequentially:

- To ensure that the fabric of the building is secure and structurally sound;

- To carry out a wildlife assessment (Bat Survey);

- To record all surviving elements of the Mill structure and its loose and fixed contents (both in traditional record and laser survey), to carry out an inventory of them and to take these elements into safe storage if possible;

- To carry out essential works to the horizontal wheel to rectify the effects of a significant earlier structural collapse, to assess the condition of various working elements and to repair them;

- To develop a strategy for managed public access and presentation of the Mill Complex;

- To rehabilitate the Mill pond

Following the completion of the first major phase of work in the period leading up to 2014/15, the buildings and contents are now secure.In 2015, OPW commissioned an external conservation expert to complete an agreed Conservation and Management Plan for the site which will inform the next steps to be taken towards the ultimate presentation of the site to visitors.Remaining elements of this work will be addressed on a progressive basis as and when resources permit.  It is not possible at this time to say exactly when the site will be open to the public.

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