UL sports arena is one of many new amenities

The first phase of a new first class multi-sports facility has just opened at the University of Limerick. The University Arena will have cost £21 million (€26.6m) when phase two is completed.

It is one of a number of major cultural, sports and leisure amenities - many of which could not have been envisaged just five years ago - currently being developed around the country. Many of the projects, which include theatre, sports facilities, conference and arts centres, are being financed by local authorities and other State agencies.

The Sports Campus Ireland at Abbotstown on the Dublin/Meath boarder, whose first phase will be available for the Special Olympics in 2002, is the shining example of the State's determination in this regard.

But developments like that at Limerick prove the point too: established to support the National Coaching and Training centre, it serves the needs of students and staff, and also attracts total beginners and top athletes. It has recently played host to the training sessions of the Munster Rugby team and was the venue for the quarter finals of the Irish Basketball Association Senior Men's Cup.

Phase two will house Ireland's first 50 metre swimming-pool, the only one large enough to allow Olympic training, according to the University.

It will have a movable floor to adjust the depth and includes a poolside classroom, competitions/meeting room, changing facilities for 200 people and a "health suite" as well as spectator accommodation for 500 people.

According to Dr Roger Downer, president of UL, the facility, including the proposed pool, "will provide the students and staff and the wider community with one of Europe's finest sports facilities".

Local authorities are discovering the buoyant economy may support the kind of leisure attractions long available in the United Kingdom. Wicklow County Council, for example, has recently completed an indoor public swimming-pool for Wicklow town and last week Environment Minister Noel Dempsey unveiled the foundation stone of a new £5 million (€6.35m) arts centre in Bray.

The arts centre will host theatrical performances, dance, music and film, and while the developers, Wicklow and Bray councils, hope that the unit will be self-financing in terms of running costs, county manager Mr Eddie Sheehy said contributions would be made towards ongoing costs if required. The local authorities would also be appointing an arts officer to further develop the project, he added.

The arts centre follows the development in Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown of the Pavilion Theatre in the Pavilion Centre, developed as a public/ private partnership project between Pavilion Leisure complex and the county council.

Elsewhere, the development of the Tralee Aquadome, which pioneered the development of aquatic centres by local authorities, is thriving, and a number of attractions such as crazy golf have now been added.