Tidy towns competition - Achievement that builds communities

IT IS 50 years since Bord Fáilte — now Fáilte Ireland — built the national Tidy Towns initiative on foundations laid by the National Spring Clean Campaign, which ran between 1953 and 1957. In the competition’s first year there were a mere 52 entrants.

Since then the competition, and, most of all, the communities who participate in it, have made a huge contribution to the betterment of this country.

This year 712 communities, a huge number for a small country, came together to express their love of their home place by doing the tremendous work necessary to be a contender in this competition.