The Carrigaline Information Age Task Force is constituted from three
organisations:
- Carrigaline Enterprise Board
- Carrigaline Community Association
- Carrigaline Community School
The Task Force has the following partners in its application:
- Cork County Council
- South Cork Enterprise Board
- West Cork LEADER Cooperative
The Task Force also includes a number of key local individuals as
advisors,
described below. In considering the make-up of the task force,
it is important to remember that despite its size, Carrigaline
has no Urban District Council. The Enterprise Board therefore
took on the role of preparing the competition application, in
consultation with the Secretary's Office of Cork County Council.
This is also why the competition application form has been
signed by Cork County Council Planning Officer and Task Force
Member Pat Lyons on behalf of the local authority,
as agreed with Paul Donnelly of Telecom Éireann.
Carrigaline Enterprise Board is a voluntary body representing local
business, industrial, educational and community interests. It has
representation from the IDA, Forbairt, Cork County Council and
the South Cork Enterprise Board. Its main aims include the promotion
of industry and business in the area. Carrigaline Enterprise
Board was instrumental in applying for LEADER funding for the
area, now carried out through West Cork LEADER Cooperative.
Carrigaline Community Association is a thriving body with numerous
subcomittees which owns and manages a large modern Community Complex.
Its activities include Tidy Towns, planning issues, town twinning, youth
activities and management of community facilities.
Carrigaline Community School is a large, modern second level school
which has state of the art IT facilities including access to
videoconferencing. It is regarded as a leader in the field of IT
provision within schools.
Task Force Membership
The photograph shows some of the Task Force members
at a public consultation meeting in Carrigaline Community School.
The draft competition application is pinned up on the boards
for comment. From right to left: Barry Cogan, Chairman of the
Task Force and Cork County Councillor; Maurice Coveney, local
businessman; Imogen Bertin, technical advisor; Michael Shields,
Principal of the Community School; John Hourihan, responsible
for IT in the Community School, and Diarmuid Cogan (Barry's son),
who has Internet and satellite communications expertise.
Barry Cogan (Chairman)
Barry Cogan has been a member of Cork County Council for 23
years. A former TD (1977-1981) and Senator (1981-1982) for Fianna
Fail, Barry has also served on the South West Regional Authority,
on the board of Cork Kerry Tourism, and as a Cork Harbour
Commissioner. He was a founder member and past chairman
of Carrigaline Community Association, a founder member of
Carrigaline Macra na Feirme, and ran the Carrigaline
Tidy Towns committee. Currently he is Chairman of Carrigaline
Enterprise Board, County Council representative on the board
of the South Cork Enterprise Board, a member of the Parish
Assembly and Vice President of Carrigaline GAA. He is also
deeply involved in Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann.
Married for 30 years, Barry has 10 children and runs
a TV and satellite business, Cogan Audio & Visual, in the town.
Tim O'Sullivan (Secretary)
Tim O'Sullivan is Vice-Principal of the Boys National
School in Carrigaline. He is also Chairperson of the Board
of Management of Colaiste Mhuire Secondary School, Crosshaven.
Deeply involved in community activities for many years, Tim has held
many positions in the Community Association, including Chairman
and Honorary Secretary. He is currently Secretary of Carrigaline
Enterprise Board and also represents the Owenabue Valley area
on the board of the West Cork LEADER Co-op.
Barry Collins (Treasurer)
The Collins family have been involved in business in Carrigaline
since 1865. Barry took over the 1,000 sq. ft supermarket in 1962.
It now covers 18,000 sq. ft. Other business interests include
pub and butcher businesses in Cork and Douglas. Future plans for
development in Carrigaline include a hotel and leisure centre complex
which has received planning permission, as well as a shopping centre
for an enlarged supermarket and 12 retail units. The plans for
the shopping centre include kiosks for public use of computers.
Barry Collins is currently vice-chairman of the Community
Association. Previously he served for four years as chairman
of the Tidy Towns committee, and was chairman of the planning
and environment sub-committee. He is also a member of Carrigaline
Enterprise Board.
Robin Gill (Vice Chairman)
For the past ten years Robin Gill has been managing director of Mitsui Denman's Cork plant,
which is involved in heavy based inorganic chemical manufacture, and
is the second largest of its kind in the world. Previously, Robin
worked with Pfizer Chemical Corporation, the Federated Union of
Employers and Albright and Wilson. Robin is Chairman of
Carrigaline Community Association, and has been active in
the association for many years. He was educated at Clongowes
Wood College and University College Dublin.
Michael Shields MSc, HDip (Ed) (PRO)
As Principal of Carrigaline's Community School, Michael
Shields is closely involved in the educational needs of the town
and has been instrumental in equipping the school with videoconferencing
and IT facilities. He is an association lecturer of the Open
University's Faculty of Education and has a keen interest in the
use of technology to facilitate open and distance learning.
Task Force Advisors
John Hourihan BSc, MEd, HDEA
John Hourihan is a second level teacher of science and maths
at Carrigaline Community School and computer manager for the school
with responsibility for the development of IT across the curriculum
and in administration. He is also a lecturer with the education
department of University College Cork on "New Technologies in
Education" teaching Higher Diploma in Education Students.
Maurice Coveney
Maurice Coveney trained as an aircraft maintenance engineer and
has worked in Ireland, England, Germany and Zaire. He returned to
Carrigaline in 1969, and runs his own mechanical engineering services
company, Carrig Engineering. Maurice is a past chairman of the Mechanical
Engineering Contractors Association of Ireland, and has been involved
in the Carrigaline Community Association on and off for twenty years,
focussing on business and youth interests. He is a founder member and
former chairman of the South Cork Opportunities Group, and is
currently vice chairman of the Carrigaline Enterprise Board. A keen
player of chess, he also enjoys "online" correspondence chess, and will be representing
Ireland at the European Club Championships in September.
Imogen Bertin
Imogen Bertin is manager of Cork Teleworking, a network of
self employed teleworkers who operate in the publishing field,
working with both paper and online documents.
Imogen founded the Irish teleworking association in 1993 and
has organised three well-attended telework conferences in
Ireland. She is currently working with the Communications Workers Union as
Irish national coordinator for the European Commission's Telework
Development Project. In 1995 Imogen co-authored the
TeleFutures
report with Gerard O'Neill of Henley Centre Ireland, sponsored
by Telecom and Forbairt. She is also co-author of The
Teleworking Handbook, sponsored by British Telecom, Lloyds
Bank and the European Commission, and a member of Forbairt's
advisory panel on telematics for the EU's 5th Framework R&D
programme.
Garry Benson
Garry Benson is a planning engineer at the large Novartis
pharmaceutical plant located between Carrigaline and Ringaskiddy.
Garry is chairman of Carrigaline Community School's Parents Association,
and also chairman of the Glenwood Residents Association. He is
also a member of the Carrigaline Toastmasters Club, and his interests
cover walking, computers and rugby.
Dr John Murphy
John Murphy qualified at UCC and undertook GP training in the UK, He
has been in practice in
Carrigaline since 1980. A member of the Irish College of General
Practitioners and the Royal College of General Practitioners (UK), he
represents Ireland on the UK council, and sees many of the developments
in technology being trialled there. His interest is in education,
and his group practice operates as a training practice for UCC's vocational
training scheme. He is using technology and networking
skills within the practice as an educational and management tool for
improving patient care. He is also interested in the extension of the
use of communications networks to broadband technology,
allowing the transmission of X-rays, ECGS etc. over distance.
In addition to his general practice commitments, he is involved in patient
care at Tabor Lodge, a local substance abuse treatment centre,
and was involved in the initial set up of a drug awareness scheme
run by the Lions Club in Carrigaline.
Pat Lyons
Pat Lyons is a planning officer with Cork County Council, located
in the council's satellite planning office in Carrigaline. Pat has been
working in Carrigaline for 18 months as part of the council's
decentralisation strategy, and originally trained as a civil
engineering technician before taking his Town Planning Diploma.
He and a colleague also cover the area
surrounding Carrigaline, including Monkstown and Crosshaven.
Through his work, and those of others located in the same office, Pat
is in constant contact with local politicians, FAS schemes,
West Cork LEADER, residents associations and so on, and will
act as a link between the County Council and the Task Force.
Brian Fitzgerald
Brian Fitzgerald has been manager of the Bank of Ireland's
Carrigaline branch for two years. Previously he was in charge of the
Bank's planning and marketing activities for Cork, Kerry and Waterford
regions. Brian has a diploma in management from the Henley
Management Centre, and is on the committee of the Institute of Bankers.
He is also a member of the Marketing Institute, and has a keen
interest in matters online. He sees great potential in a number
of telebanking ideas including electronic purses and PC based
access to account information. Overall, he believes that using
the new technology allows banks to get computers to do the menial
tasks, while bank staff concentrate on their key skill
- interacting with and serving people. Bank of Ireland has committed
itself to supporting the Information Age Town competition winners through telebanking
services and Internet shopping malls, and by evaluating the potential
of any new technologies installed.
Robert O'Sullivan
Robert is a 5th year student at Carrigaline Community
School, and is webmaster of the school's Internet site.
In 1995 he won first place in the IBM/DCU under 15 programming
competition. In 1994, he attended a summer course in computer
applications at DCU's Centre for Talented Youth In Ireland.
Robert acts as the Task Force link to youth in Carrigaline,
liaising with the Youth Club, the National Schools and
employment programmes for the under 25s.
Approach to the competition
The picture shows a consultation meeting held
in the Community School. The school's ISDN conferencing
equipment can be seen in the background.
Despite its size, the town has no UDC and as a result,
Carrigaline only heard about the Information Age Town
competition four weeks before the deadline. This application
is evidence of how active and strong the community is, and the way in which
it already uses information age technology. Much of the research
was done over the Internet, some of it by 4th year school pupils.
Public consultation took place face-to-face with key figures,
through surveys and by a public meeting held in the school.
Collation of the surveys was done through teleworking between
those carrying out the surveys, the Owenabue Valley Company Enterprise
Office and Cork Teleworking. The application was written as a
web site from the beginning, and will be publically available
online as soon as the competition entry deadline has passed.
Ray Padden, photographer for the Carrighdoun newspaper, plus local
photographers
Howard Crowdy, Mike Wall and Joe Healey generously provided graphic material at short notice.
Carrigaline as a community has a history of putting its
money where its mouth is. Financial and training issues are
repeatedly mentioned by other telecommunity projects worldwide.
Therefore we would like to see a three-pronged approach to
the project should we be shortlisted. Firstly, there must be
facilities for free public access to the services to ensure that
social division does not result. Secondly, there must be funding
to train the trainers and to ensure that everyone who wants to
can learn to use these technologies. But thirdly, the project
must be sustainable. Therefore we think that home access to the
local Internet system probably should be charged for from the start
of the project, and that the training services should, after a pilot
period, also be charged for, and we would want to consider charging
mechanisms and levels at an early stage of the planning process.
Summary of infastructure provision requested
- Local Internet information service
- Provision of home PCs and Internet access won through a local lottery
- Public access interactive kiosks located in shopping mall,
community complex, school and library plus possible hotel
- Video noticeboards located in hotel, shopping mall,
community complex and school
- ISDN connections for videoconferencing and remote
surveillance applications
- PCs and Internet connections upgraded for all schools
- Telemarketing training centre and knowledge resource centre
located at community school
- Public access PCs and Internet connections in library plus
facilities for self directed learning
- Adult education facilities in basic IT skills available
in conjunction with the VEC at the Parish Centre, which also
has a creche to assist women returners in upgrading
their skills.
Organisational plans
The Task Force sees its role as organising those parts of
the Information Age project which need a neutral public body
to operate them, such as the local information service. For example,
both Blacksburg and La Plaza suffered difficulties with allowing
general access to their local information system due
to controversial material posted by those of strong
and in some cases offensive views. This has led to a situation where
the main systems are controlled for content on a neutral basis
allowing voluntary groups to put up information. Others who want
to publish their own web pages are referred to a separate commercial
web publishing subsidiary, and we would hope that a similar
arrangement could operate in Carrigaline, perhaps following the
Danish model of involving local businesses like newspapers.
The Victoria
Telecommunity in Canada was
taken to court by one user because it cut off his account due to
his publication of unacceptable material. The telecommunity won.
It would also be vital to provide web publishing expertise in
the initial stages of the project through this neutral information
gathering and publishing service as little suitable expertise
will initially be available.
Overall, we envisage probably a 3-4 person team handling the day
to day details of the project, probably consisting of:
- Technical advisor and coordinator provided by Telecom
- Information specialist collating information from nonprofit groups and providing
web publishing facilities
- Training specialist coordinating training programmes and
awareness seminars, and liaising between the library, the knowledge
resource centre in the school and the VEC courses in the Parish Centre.
- Manager/PR person/strategist responsible to Telecom and the Task Force.
The Task Force itself would need to liaise with the various bodies
outlined in the linkages page, and to keep up to date on developments
in other Information Age projects, as well as keeping close tabs
the local community and Telecom regarding the progress of the project to ensure
it remains closely linked to those services desired by Carrigaline
residents. Regular feedback surveys and information
on the Internet usage should be made publically available
where possible. As soon as the Information Age services
have been decided, the Task Force would work with Telecom
to ensure that the services can be made sustainable and
economically viable in the long term.
British Telecom community networks researcher
Doug Williams has
sent us the following pointers:
-
Have a strategy with the backing of local government
- Have serious commitment to making it work from the private sector
- Make the local web site good to look at and make it 'look like' the place
it represents
- Enable communication as much as (if not more than) information provision
- Be an excellent publicity machine
- Do training
- Make the technology available through Community based computer centres
- Enable commerce on and as a result of the web
We feel that this application follows Doug's advice and we hope
to follow these principles in Carrigaline to ensure that
any technology the town receives is used to provide a true
national showplace where the technology becomes part
of the town's day to day life.
Acknowledgement
The Task Force would like to thank Maryann McCarthy, CES worker
with the Owenabue Valley Enterprise Company for her hard work and
enthusiasm in helping prepare this application. We would
also like to thank the many people of Carrigaline mentioned
in this document who have helped to prepare a true picture
of our Information Age Town, and those from other information
age towns around the world who have given freely of their
time and advice to help us on our way.
If you want to comment on these pages, please email the
Carrigaline Task Force. Please
note that under the terms of the Information Age Town competition, these pages
have become copyright © Telecom Éireann 1997