Best laid plans go awry in Shannon

AS 2008 began the people of Shannon were shown a masterplan for their town’s future and it was jaw dropping.

The plan, which was going to cost between €400 and €500 million, was devised at the tail end of the Celtic Tiger era and reflected the attitude towards development that had prevailed.
At a public meeting in the Oakwood Arms, residents were told that Shannon would finally get a conventional town centre for the first time, with the development of the so-called TC2-TC3 zone, which combined with other works costing tens of millions, were going to transform the town.
Projections of five million people a year using Shannon Airport were outlined, an increase that was going to require improvements in infrastructure.
Incredibly, in light of what has happened since, some people at the meeting were genuinely concerned about the safety of a light rail system in Shannon.
Three years on, there is no light rail system and no prospect of anyone investing half a billion euro in developing the town. Just over 1.75 million people used the airport last year, a fraction of what seemed possible in January 2008.
Since the plans were announced the town has suffered hugely, with serious job losses at the Shannon Free Zone, which has played a massive part in Clare’s economy for decades.
As in many parts of the county, emigration has returned and the amount of young people leaving is reflected in the fact that Wolfe Tones have had to pull their intermediate hurling team this year.
Brendan Hughes represents players on the club executive. A dual player, he said that the decision not to enter an intermediate hurling side came after the loss of seven or eight players, including former Clare captain Brian O’Connell, to emigration and the retirement of players, such as Frank Lohan and Ray Carley.
“One or two would have been working but the rest of them would have been out of work,” he says of the players who have emigrated.
Despite the haemorrhage of hurlers, he says the club is getting on with it. “The mood is still very good and lads have responded well. In the off season when you heard players were going it looked bad but when you come back and see numbers training it’s encouraging and there were lads back who hadn’t played in a while for work or study reasons.”
Parish priest, Fr Tom Ryan says the changes in the town are quite noticeable.
“Money is tight. Even from a parish point of view the weekly income would be down €400 or €500 a week compared to a couple of years ago. There’s a lack of disposable income but people are still determined to fight on and overcome this. People are tailoring their lifestyles to their income now.”
Of course, the lack of work has left people struggling with debt and Des McDonnell of St Vincent De Paul says there is a lot more demand for the charity’s support. “It’s up about 40% compared to two and a half years ago,” he says.
The profile of people who need help has changed too. “We’re getting calls from people now who have bought their own houses. Some of them are in trouble now and they would never have come to us before.”
He says people formerly employed in construction make up a very large proportion of the people whose circumstances have declined.
While the town has felt the brunt of the collapse in construction, a huge amount of jobs have been lost at the industrial estate, despite last week’s announcement of new investments by Cregg Logistics and Zagg International.
In 2008, Avocent (57), Buffalo Technology (48), Sykes Enterprises (83), Laser Cut Engineering (20), Schwarz Pharma (55) and Element Six (150) all announced major job losses. Overall, employment in the Free Zone declined by 11% that year.
The job losses continued the following year, with Element Six and Schwarz Pharma laying off more workers, along with Molex, Tecnotree, GE Money, Agilysis Contact Services and Sky Handling Partners.
Last year things weren’t so bleak but one Thursday in October, Shannon Aerospace and Elsevier announced a combined total of 207 job losses. Overall, another 4% of jobs at the Free Zone were lost in 2010.
The decline in Shannon’s industrial base has come at the same time as a collapse in traffic at the airport. Despite some encouraging signs in the latter part of last year, the overall trend at the airport is very negative. The total number of passengers last year was 1.75m, compared to 2.79m in 2009 and 3.63m in 2006.
Mayor of Shannon Tony Mulcahy says that when the jobs were going, more should have been done. “We should have brought in a job subsidy at the time, €100 per employee for the companies, which would be designed to keep people employed. It took them a while to get going, as it did with most decisions they made but they brought in a subsidy for export companies only. There were a lot of call centres in Shannon that didn’t qualify and that had a severe impact. Everything was too slow.”
He says subsequent efforts to keep jobs had been too little too late.
However, the pace of job losses in Shannon has certainly slowed down, and last week, plans to create 300 jobs were announced. Across the country there are hopes of an export-led recovery.
While Councillor Mulcahy recognises there has been an improvement, he says there is a long way to go. “There’s a bit of a buzz in some of the factories that are left. There’s definitely a bit of forward momentum there but trying to recover what was lost is going to be a huge challenge.”
Councillor Patricia McCarthy has served Shannon for decades and when she looks back on the TC2/TC3 plan, she feels an opportunity to develop a conventional town centre was lost because of a reluctance to flesh out proposals.
“Going back 15 or 20 years ago we wanted to develop the town but we got a bit bogged down in planning and sometimes you can wait too long.”
She feels that the airport will be the catalyst for revival in Shannon.
“We still have to focus on the airport, that’s the driver for the economy. Also I’d like to see Shannon Development reinvest in the industrial estate. It looks it bit jaded and making improvements would create jobs, improve the estate and give a bit of confidence,” she concludes.