Another Bingo Hall Set For Demolition?

News has come through of yet another bingo hall under threat of demolition with plans with plans to replace it with a new development.

The Star Bingo Hall in Crumlin, near Belfast, could be demolished if a planning application for apartments, shops and a medical centre on the site is granted by Dublin City Council.

The club sees 2,500 customers a week coming from miles around as It’s a popular pastime for them. The manager Sandy Coleman says that “Seventy per cent of these women here don’t drink, so this is their outlet.”

Over the years, the Star Bingo Hall has provided the area with many forms of entertainment as the building has been used as a cinema, a skating rink and a bowling alley, and for the past 25 years has been the Star Bingo Hall. 

The news of the closure has come as a shock to the thousands of players who regularly attend the club, and have made the following comments; 

“It’s very important. People have been coming here for years, especially old people. It’s the only thing some of they have,” says one of the workers. “Many of the women come here just to get out of the house,” she added.

“I’d be lost without it I hope they don’t move it. I’d miss it terrible. I must be coming here 10 years or more.” -Carmel Behan from Tallaght

“You get €150 for a line here whereas down home you only get €15,” -Elizabeth Wickham, who travels up from Newbridge with her friend Deborah at least twice a week.

“I’d be dead and buried if it went,” -Bridget Lynch, who is known as ‘Mrs Bingo’ throughout the hall. “I’ve won the jackpot umpteen times. This is my home. I’d die from loneliness if it went.”

The sites Proposed plans are for a 49 apartment development that would also contain two shops and a medical centre.

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