Christopher Woodhouse
Today at 18:47
Bonfire builders in east Belfast are being begged to make this year the last time they place their pyre next to a public library.
Windows on two sides of the building in the Tullycarnet estate have already been boarded up ahead of this year’s Eleventh Night celebrations.
The bonfire is erected in the car park immediately beside the library on Granton Park, with scorch marks left by previous pyres visible in satellite images on Google Maps.
Each year Libraries NI takes action to protect the building which has cost the taxpayer five figure sums in the past.
Although the bonfire is nowhere near the size of some of those built elsewhere in Northern Ireland, it sits just yards from a public library and has led to calls for it to be moved to an alternative site.
Alliance Party councillor Hedley Abernethy told Sunday Life he would like to see the organisers move the bonfire to another site next year.
“Alliance supports the safe and respectful display of culture. Having to board up a library is not that,” he said.
“The Tullycarnet Library is a valuable and well-used resource for the entire community and for that reason I would urge the organisers to relocate the bonfire.”
Later this month Tullycarnet Library will celebrate 50 years since it first opened its doors to the people of the area in 1974.
It hosts several weekly events for the benefit of the community including a ‘Rhythm and Rhyme’ session to introduce toddlers to songs and poems, a tea and newspaper morning every Monday, a Lego Club and a children’s storytime session once a month to help youngsters improve their reading ability.
Previous measures taken to protect the library from the blaze have included the removal of 98 double-glazed windows and frames to temporary storage at a cost of just over £10,000.
The sum also included the fitting of temporary plywood panels to the empty window frames and the subsequent reinstallation of the double glazing. Libraries NI is the business name of the Northern Ireland Library Authority which is funded by the Department for Communities.
When asked what measures have been taken to protect the building ahead of the Eleventh Night this year, a Libraries NI spokesperson said: “The windows on two of the sides of Tullycarnet Library have been boarded up as a precaution.”
The Tullycarnet Bonfire has its own Facebook page to promote the night it’s set alight, with this year featuring a foam disco, a laser light show and fire entertainers with live music from a DJ.
Images posted on the page show the bonfire in recent years decorated with UDA flags during its construction period, with one even hung on the outside of the boarded-up library in 2021.
It has also seen Irish tricolours and Irish republican flags placed on it ahead of being lit and in 2022, even the flag of the former Soviet Union which was dissolved in 1991.
by Browns_right_foot