A benchmark project: Save The Lough

Most towns or cities have an iconic area where urbanisation is held at bay and citizens can get just a glimpse of what the world might have been like before human domination.

That might be an overly grandiose way of describing Cork City’s Lough but it is certainly iconic — and sadly dead.

A mystery illness has wiped out the Lough’s carp population and a restoration project could take many years.

At a time when reports of environmental destruction — manmade or natural — are almost everyday this may seem a minor enough tragedy but it might just be the kind of opportunity Cork City needs.

What a wonderful, uplifting response it would be if the community, the local authority, and business interests came together not just to restore but to enhance and develop the Lough as a world-class urban nature reserve.

It seems a desirable project on so many levels.

It would show that we can undo destruction; that we can find room for wildlife in our cities and, most of all, it would show how uplifting it can be if we face up to our environmental obligations.