Ireland’s cleanest and dirtiest towns and cities in 2022 have been named in a new ‘anti-litter league’ survey.
Naas retained its crown as the cleanest area in Ireland, pipping Kilkenny and Maynooth to the top spot.
The Kildare town was praised for attaining “a level of cleanliness and presentation that should inspire local authorities across the country to better things”, with its Main Street singled out as “exceptionally well presented and maintained”.
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On the bottom end of the scale, Mahon in Cork was the only area dubbed “seriously littered”. Dumping was listed as a definite issue, with “many sites let down not just because of casual litter but due to presence of dumped items”, such as dirty nappies.
Dublin’s North Inner City and Cork City Centre followed behind as “littered”.
The survey, carried out by Irish Business Against Litter, showed a significant rise in the numbers of areas deemed clean across Ireland - with cleanliness levels nationwide improving by 6%.
Three quarters of the 40 cities and towns surveyed were clean, compared to just over half this time last year.
While Naas was again top of the rankings, city areas showed greatest improvement, notably Dublin City which rose to ‘moderately littered’ as did Galvone in Limerick, recording one of its best scores of recent years.
IBAL’s Conor Horgan commented: “The results reflect a pattern of improvement since the peak of the Covid pandemic, when litter levels soared, especially in cities.
“In particular we are seeing local authorities concentrate their efforts on ridding areas of heavily littered sites. We have no reason to believe this improvement will not be sustained. Cleanliness is a virtuous circle: clean streets beget clean streets, inspiring a pride and consciousness of the environment among people.”
Meanwhile, the survey found that plastic bottles and cans continue to be a major source of litter, second only to sweet wrappers.
IBAL stated that the findings bolster the case for a deposit return scheme, which is due to be introduced this year, and which will see consumers paying a deposit which they can reclaim on returning their containers to a retailer or other collection point.
Mr Horgan explained: “Based on this data the scheme is sorely needed and stands to rid our streets of a significant amount of litter. The same applies to the proposed coffee cup levy.”
The survey also showed cigarette butts remain a persistent form of litter.
Mr Horgan said: "We welcome the announcement that cigarette manufacturers will now be contributing to the cost of clean-up, but we really need to see preventative measures such as widespread butt disposal facilities alongside innovative packaging which can store butts.”
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