By Alan Healy
Derry's council has been asked to look at ways of reducing noise coming from large scale events at a local leisure centre following complaints from surrounding residents.
The issue was raised at Thursday afternoon’s meeting of Derry City and Strabane District Council’s Heath and Community meeting, during a discussion on proposed new structured events schedule for the Foyle Arena.
The meeting was told that since opening in April 2015, the facility has been ‘well-utilised’, as the centre also ‘has the ability to host medium scale events and conferences of up 1,000 people’.
A report presented to the meeting added that the Arena’s ‘modern facilities, coupled with its capability to host medium scale events, has led to an increased demand for the hosting of events’.
Many of these ‘require facilitation outside of the normal opening hours of the centre and can cause displacement and disruption’, the report continued.
However, due to the level of demand it is now experiencing, the local council is now proposing to bring in a ‘more structured and balanced approach to facilitating events [which] would be beneficial to both staff, regular hirers, [and] residents.’
The new structure would also give those hiring the Foyle Arena a ‘clear understanding of what can and cannot be facilitated’.
Speaking at Thursday’s meeting, the Waterside SDLP councillor Tina Gardiner said that in relation to recent ‘Tier 1 and Tier 2’ events, that people living close to the Foyle Arena had been ‘taken by surprise’ as there was a ‘lot of noise outside working hours’.
A Tier 1 event is classed as an event which will run outside of normal opening hours, have ‘music or will have sustained levels of noise’, an attendance of 500 people or more with an alcohol licence required.
Tier 2, meanwhile, is classed as running outside of normal opening hours, and again have music or will have sustained levels of noise with anticipated occupancy of over 200 people – but no alcohol licence is required.
Too loud, too late
Cllr Gardiner added that she appreciated that events did have to be hosted at the Foyle Arena, and while it may ‘affect a small number of homes’, complaints had been made by families with small children who said that the music from the recent events was ‘too loud and went on too late’.
“Are they any plans to mitigate that?” she added.
Responding, Barry O'Hagan. Head of Leisure and Community Development, said that council ‘regularly met with affected residents’.
He added that it was ‘about balancing the needs’ of those hosting the events with that of residents and service users of the Foyle Arena, given that it was ‘primarily a leisure centre’.
Meanwhile, Sinn Fein’s Christopher Jackson said that while some of the events held at the Foyle Arena were ‘quite successful and substantial’, they had caused ‘major concerns for residents living close by and service users’.
He added that there were further concerns in relation to the time it took to set up these events and the ‘disruption’ in the aftermath when removing equipment.
Mr O’Hagan replied that there was ‘no real structure around it’, with a consultation period now set to commence in November to further refine the structured events schedule proposal.
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