After decades of operating throughout a range of splintered facilities and colleges around Dublin, DIT has obtained a large campus which will unify it and provide better facilities for future students.
Like most colleges in this position DIT had been looking to consolidate it’s faculties for some time and have been lucky enough to find an ideal location in the heart of the city.
A 70 acre disused site at Grangegorman is to provide the new location for the college and will merge the 39 existing DIT sites into one campus for the first time in 125 years. The site had been disused for the last 20 years and, keen to protect its long history, DIT are retaining a selection of old protected structures dating from the 1820’s onwards and reincorporating them with the majority of the development, which will be comprised of modern buildings. This interesting blend of old and new will add character to the campus and the college hopes that DIT will revitalise the surrounding area of Grangegorman into a vibrant new urban quarter.
The campus is set to be complete by 2017, providing improved facilities for 20,000 students and 2,000 staff members. New buildings include arts buildings, a student centre, new architecture, engineering, business and tourism faculties and a central library. There will be a main walk way running through the entire campus called ‘St Brendan’s Way’, as a connection to the history of the site. There will be a Luas stop at the entrance to the campus, which will be of added convenience for students.
From September 2014 on, over half of all DIT’s education and research provision will be moved to the new site and there is a list of the courses that will be based there on the DIT website www.dit.ie. The National Transport Authority has also developed a journey planner to help staff and students to find the most convenient form of public transport to the campus and a list of the directions can be found at http://www.dit.ie/about/grangegorman/informationforstudents/transporttothenewcampus/. To follow the progress of the new campus or for more information visit www.dit.ie
Author Fiona McBennett