‘Pristine’ – spotless Kilkenny tops national litter league survey for fifth time

By SHANE DORAN

KILKENNY has come out tops in the latest litter survey.

The Marble City was described as “pristine” by judges as it returned to the summit of the Irish Business Against Littler (IBAL) league table.

The number one ranking will come as a significant boost to the city as we enter the peak tourist season.

An Taisce complimented Kilkenny on “returning to a place it has been many times – the top of the IBAL table. The entire area was pristine.”

The latest IBAL survey showed Kilkenny, Killarney and Dublin, Galway and Cork city centres registering record levels of cleanliness.

Portlaoise, Tralee and Letterkenny enjoyed their best-ever showings in the survey and were among 14 towns deemed to be ‘Cleaner than European norms”.

By contrast, Ballymun was deemed a litter blackspot at the foot of the rankings. Dublin North Inner City was again seriously littered, a status IBAL attributes in part to the widespread use of bags over bins in domestic waste collection.

Litter levels were assessed in 40 towns and cities across the country by An Taisce, who found 31 of them, or 77% to be clean. This was in line with recent IBAL surveys.

Kilkenny topped the rankings for the fifth time, ahead of Athlone and Killarney, and the centres of our main cities Dublin, Cork, Galway and Waterford were cleaner than previously, only Limerick failing to achieve ‘Clean’ status.

“Today’s tourists demand high levels of cleanliness and these results indicate that’s what they will be getting this year when they come to Ireland,” said IBAL’s Conor Horgan.

“It is also important that their first impression be a good one, so it’s pleasing to see the roads around Dublin Airport are again to Clean to European norms.”

Irish towns and cities deemed ‘cleaner than European norms’:

(1) Kilkenny
(2) Athlone
(3) Killarney
(4) Portlaoise
(5) Tralee
(6) Ballina
(7) Newbridge
(8) Letterkenny
(9) Roscommon
(10) Fermoy
(11) Leixlip
(12) Midleton