The fundamental groupoid as a topological groupoid

Abstract

Let X be a topological space. Then we may define the fundamental groupoid πX and also the quotient groupoid (πX)/N for N any wide, totally disconnected, normal subgroupoid N of πX (1). The purpose of this note is to show that if X is locally path-connected and semi-locally 1-connected, then the topology of X determines a “lifted topology” on (πX)/N so that it becomes a topological groupoid over X. With this topology the subspace which is the fibre of the initial point map ∂′: (πX)/N→X over x in X, is the usual covering space of X determined by the normal subgroup N{x} of the fundamental group π(X, x).