This week, as we had a day of exceptionally foul weather for this time of year, several of the committee made a short visit to the proposed site at the Geodha Sgoilt.
The land belongs to Uig and Hamnaway Estate, which has offered, through Sir Peter Cresswell, to gift the plot to the community for Ionad Hiort. During WW2 the site was, along with Brenish and Mealista, a radar station manned by upward of 200 RAF personnel. A a number of Nissen huts were erected at the Geodha Sgoilt and the concrete bases and chunks of broken brick and concrete remain.
The site is all on Mangurstadh common grazings, part of which was apportioned and re-seeded in the 1960s by a group of local crofters: Donald Buchanan No9, his cousin Murdo Buchanan No7, Murdo Macleod No10, and Donald Morrison. This whole area of land had to be re-fenced again in the mid 1990s, by Donald Buchanan and his sons Murdanie and Iain (now chair of the Development Group).
The old buildings are still used occasionally for gathering the sheep into; these buildings will likely be knocked down during to make way for the centre, but blast-proof walls that once protected the radar scanner contain a large quantity of fine dressed stone, seemingly from the Valtos Glen quarries, which may be repurposed during the development.
Press release, 12 March 2010.
The St Kilda Centre Development Group (Buidheann Leasachaidh Ionad Hiort) has welcomed the final report from Jura Consultants which sets out recommendations and next steps for the project.
Potential costs for creating the centre are put at between £4 million and £6 million depending on size and content, and a hub and spoke model is recommended in order to maximise economic benefits for the whole of the Western Isles.
Jura Consultants were appointed by a Working Party which included representation from Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Proiseact nan Ealan, Visit Scotland and the National Trust for Scotland. After an intensive competition, they supported the choice of a cliff-top site at Mangurstadh in Uig for the Centre.
The report states: “This project has the opportunity to deliver a world leading Centre in connection with a Dual World Heritage Status Designated Site, which will attract international interest across everything that it does; including interpretation, research, teaching, events and activities.
“Excellence will be the aspiration for everything associated with the Centre…. The hub and spoke model will enable the St Kilda story to be presented across the Outer Hebrides in-situ in the most appropriate locations”.
The report recommends that the Uig group should engage with other stakeholders, including UNESCO, to form a Trust which would have responsibility for taking the project forward. The involvement of UNESCO, the consultants suggest, would open up funding routes “which may be less accessible without UNESCO involvement”.
The report then suggests that a sub-group of the new charitable trust should created “with representations from all organisations and communities which wish to be involved in the project as spokes or beneficiaries of the St Kilda Centre project … This will ensure that the benefits of the project are appropriately dispersed across the Outer Hebrides in a cohesive and comprehensive way”.
The chairman of Buidheann Leaschaidh Ionad Hiort, Iain Buchanan, said that they welcomed the consultants’ final report, their emphasis on excellence and the future steps that they proposed. Work aimed at involving all the key stakeholders in a Trust was already progressing, he said, and an advisory group is being formed to involve a wide range of expertise.
Mr Buchanan added: “This is a huge undertaking for a small community and we intend to be as inclusive as possible, both by securing expert advice from the outset and by involving other communities which can contribute to the overall success of the project. We have always said that this is an opportunity for the whole of the Western Isles”.
