BY BRENDAN CARROLL

City planners have given the go-ahead for a 1,000-pupil new secondary school to be built in Dangan – as a new home for St Joseph’s College, The Bish.

The Patrician Brothers, who run the school, currently based in Nun’s Island in the city centre, have made a number of relatively minor changes to their plans, to meet concerns raised since they lodged their application in June last year.

The proposed development, on a site close to the University of Galway sports campus off the Galway-Clifden Road, will involve the construction of a modern 11,134 square metre school to include classrooms, a PE/multi-purpose Hall, a two-classroom Special Needs Unit and specialist room accommodation.

There will also be five external ball courts, 65 car parking spaces – reduced from the originally-sought 79 – and 195 bicycle racks.

Access to the school campus will be through a new road to be built directly across from the junction of Circular Road with the N59, where new traffic lights will be installed.

The new entrance road will be a shared access route with people using the university’s existing sports facilities in Dangan – at the same time, St Anne’s Road, which is currently used to get to the university facilities, will be limited to pedestrians and cyclists.

The 6.5-acre site has been secured by the school as part of a land-swap agreement with the University of Galway, which will take ownership of the Nuns’ Island site once the new school is built.

The current Bish school was built in 1970 to cater for 450 pupils, but this number has since expanded to more than 750. The new campus would be able to accommodate up to 1,000 pupils.