Galway City is in the top 10 cleanest areas in the country, but Ballybane is still ‘littered’ in 39th place.
Sligo has been named the cleanest town in the country - and it's the first time it's taken the top spot, ahead of Leixlip, Westport and Monaghan.
Dublin’s North Inner City is bottom of the IBAL rankings, but is much improved on the previous year.
The An Taisce report for Galway City stated:
An exceptionally good result for Galway City – not only were there fifteen out of twenty sites which deserved the top litter grade, there were no heavily littered sites. A few top ranking sites deserve special mention: the lovely park environment of Glenard Park, shopping street called ‘High Street’, Recycle Facility at Westgate, University Sports Pavilion and Galway City Library – not only were they very good with regards to litter, the presentation & maintenance of same was excellent. The Grounds of University Hospital had long been plagued by a very heavy cigarette butt presence – while smoking on the campus is not permitted, a ‘temporary’ solution has been provided, by way of a plastic bag for the butts.
The An Taisce report for Ballybeg stated:
It wasn’t so much that Ballybane had a high number of very heavily littered sites that places it towards the bottom of the league – it was the dearth of top-ranking ones i.e. just three out of ten surveyed. The poorly presented sites didn’t get into this state overnight and have been highlighted in previous IBAL surveys – St. Bridget’s Church (perimeter wall area) and Ballybane Library were heavily littered. By far the most heavily littered sites were Ballybane Village and Ballybane Industrial Estate – they have been subject to long-term dumping and neglect.
