County Kildare Walking Routes Project - Kildare.ie

County Kildare Walking Routes Project
1. Introduction
Kildare County Council, in co-operation with the Heritage Council, County Kildare Failte and
Kildare Sports Partnership, wish to conduct a study of recreational walking routes in County
Kildare with a focus on heritage.
Kildare County Council has contracted CSA Group Ltd. to identify the full range of established
recreational walking routes in the county to assess their overall quality, character,
management status and potential for creating awareness and appreciation of the county’s
heritage.
The Irish Sports Council (ISC) has commissioned Coillte Consult Ltd to conduct an audit of
promoted walking routes across the country (Irish recreational Trails Audit 2005) as part of
the research being carried out for the National Trails Strategy. The audit will capture and
provide baseline information on all developed and managed recreational walking, cycling
horse riding and water/paddle trails in County Kildare.
The consultants brief for this project has three distinctive components:
(i) Phase I of this project will expand on the results of the audit for County
Kildare and identify the full range of established recreational walking routes
in the county. These established routes will then be evaluated against a set
of agreed criteria.
(ii) Phase II will identify other potential walking routes through out the county
and conduct an evaluation of these routes against the established criteria.
(iii) Phase III will develop a promotional strategy for the established and
developed routes in the county (phase I) and a development plan, including
recommendations for the development of potential routes identified in
phase II, which will bring these routes up to the necessary standard,
required for promotion.
This is the final report of the project.
2. Methodology
The methodology has three phases, consultation, map based audit and physical audit. The
ISC Trail Audit is the starting point for the walking route evaluation. The section on Kildare
was reviewed. Consultation with members of the Steering Committee identified any
significant routes that may have been omitted. The evaluation was undertaken in a phased
process that identified the routes with the greatest potential for promotion and
development.
Through research, face to face interviews and consultation with stakeholders, a subset of
the existing walking routes was scored and graded under the key evaluation headings to
test the selection process. There was an ongoing and iterative analysis of results and
routes were scored based on the evaluation criteria developed by CSA and approved by
the Steering Group. The research involved review of publications on Kildare local history
and heritage, investigation of websites related to tourism and community development in
Kildare and collection of promotional literature related to walking in Kildare. Interviews and
consultation with Kildare Sport Council, Coillte Teoranta, Kildare County Council, Kildare
CSA Project 3419 1