Farranree is bottom of the league for litter

Farranree on the northside of Cork City, has been named the dirtiest location in the country on its first-ever appearance in the Irish Businesses Against Litter league.

The suburb has been ranked at the foot of a table of 40 towns and urban centres across the country, which is topped by Kilkenny and Cavan.

The report said Farranree could improve its position substantially if a number of moderately littered locations in the area were cleaned.

The IBAL surveyors found that sweet papers, fast food packaging and cigarette butts were the most common litter across the country.

Eighteen towns, including Cobh, Clonmel, Tralee, Waterford and Killarney were, deemed to be cleaner than European standards.

A further 13, including Ennis, Dundalk, Galway and Fermoy, met the normal litter levels on the continent.

The major city centres of Cork, Limerick and Dublin were moderately littered and IBAL’s Conor Horgan said not enough was being done to make the busier centres as litter-free as the towns that surround them.

“We’re just not seeing the progress in cities that we need. While tourist areas generally have fared very well, how can we project Ireland as a clean country to visit if large parts of three main cities are littered?” he said.

In Cork city the inspectors said the areas around Grand Parade and Tuckey Street were very well kept but these were dragged down by household dumping on Vicar Street, waste at Glen River Park and unsightliness on the South Ring Road.

There was particular concern for Tallaght and the two worst locations in the country, Farranree and Dublin’s north inner city.

Mr Horgan said the challenge for larger cities was to create the same sense of community responsibility that existed elsewhere.

And this, he said, was a project for city councils.

“In cities, communities tend to be less cohesive and relying on volunteers to clean up a large urban area is not feasible. However, establishing such groups has to be part of any urban authority’s plan in the current cost environment. It’s not just the physical work these groups carry out, it’s the sense of responsibility they create, which rubs off on the whole community,” he said.

IBAL has also begun incorporating the routes into and out of towns in the surveys which it said was done because the positive work in centres can be undermined by ugly settings on the drive out.

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