BRITAIN'S Millennium Commission has announced a grant of £225,800 for a plan to use the muscle power of 1,000 young people to raise a 25-tonne stone "megalith" on the shores of Strangford Lough. It has turned down funding for a cultural centre for north Belfast, however.
The "Strangford Stone" project will involve locating and quarrying a Mourne granite stone of some 12.5 metres long, designing a means of transporting the stone to Delamont Country Park, Killyleagh, preparing the site, and selecting and training the 1,000 young people.
There will be a three-day "camp" at Delamont in 1999 to erect the Megalith, using only ropes, tackle and human muscle power. The stone will stand 10 metres above ground to become a new landmark.
The Millennium Commission has also approved a grant of £2.5 million to restore the Victorian Cliff path known as the Gobbins path, at Islandmagee, Co Antrim, and to build a visitor centre.
However, the Greater New Lodge Cultural Society, in one of the areas of highest deprivation in the North, has described as "devastating" the commission's decision not to fund a cultural centre for north Belfast.
The society said the commission had refused the £2.5 million funding sought for the project on the grounds of "the availability and the level of security of partnership funding" and "the lack of a viable business plan".
The community of the New Lodge were deeply disappointed, the society said in a statement. For the last 18 months their hopes had been raised that eventually much-needed facilities were to be built in their area. The project was to include a sports centre for the local GAA club, an educational facility, an exhibition centre, a women's centre and a creche facility.