Plans to establish a tourist attraction detailing the legend of Merlin and its connection to Dumfriesshire have taken a step forward.
Clyde (Dumfries & Galloway) Community Fund, administered by Foundation Scotland, has announced a £10,000 grant to the Arthur Trail Association.
Together with grants from the Minnygap Community Fund and Annandale and Nithsdale Community Benefit Company completes a total budget of £30,000 for a feasibility study for a multi-million pound Dark Age Centre at Beattock and Moffat.
The proposed centre will be sited to attract traffic off the M74 for an immersive experience using next generation technology.
It will "reveal a forgotten heritage of one of the most dramatic and dynamic times of our history when the elements which formed Scotland were beginning to come together".
READ MORE: Glasgow Museums acquires Alasdair Gray’s ‘most significant’ painting
It will have as its interpretive theme the world-wide fascination with Merlin.
Satellite developments in small rural communities with distinctive themes north and south of the centre are planned to be the subject of a separate study next year.
The hope is that the facility will be a must-see attraction for a pan-generational, international audience, attracting 200,000 visitors a year.
The feasibility team is being led by heritage consultant Rob Robinson, Designer/Architect Ben Tyndall, and Producer/Director Robin Crichton. They will be supported by a steering group representing community know-how and stakeholder interests.
Robin Crichton said: “This is an off-the-wall approach; an immersive time travel back to a lost world. Tourism has been in steady decline for decades as traffic rushes past to the Central Belt and the Highlands. Currently only 2% of visitors are from overseas.
“This study will examine and assess the potential of attracting visitors to discover a beautiful but unknown area currently off the international map. It will not be more of the same and our funders are to be congratulated on their vision. It is local community-based but international in outlook.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here