Castlebar and Ballina were both celebrating earlier this week with the news that they have moved up in the Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL ) standings for 2008. Castlebar saw its ranking shoot up 28 places from number 36 last year and break into the top ten at number eight. Ballina were also celebrating a double-digit rise from number 49 to 37, moving it from a seriously littered town to a moderately littered town.
An Taisce, commentED: “The best ever result for Castlebar – can it be the outright winner in 2008? Castlebar has scored very highly – there were just two sites out of ten surveyed which were moderately littered. Three out of the four approach routes were excellent, creating a positive first impression of the town which was sustained for the majority of the remaining sites. The top ranking sites were not just clear of litter but very well maintained e.g. Castlebar shopping centre, swimming pool, Currach Gardens and Chestnut Grove. The overall presentation of GMIT Castlebar was much improved on previous IBAL anti-litter surveys, resulting in a very good site this time around,” the report stated.
While commenting on Ballina, An Taisce said,: “There has been a big change for the better at Ballina with fewer heavily littered sites. One of the most striking improvements was the Dunnes Stores car park – previously this had been seriously marred by ‘drinking parties’ and all associated debris – not so, this time around. Three out of the four approach roads were excellent (Church Road approach, Killala approach and Crossmilina approach ) but the fourth (Foxford approach ) was heavily littered. The second poor site in Ballina was at the cinema complex – this was characterised by broken glass and heavy levels of a wide variety of food related litter. The occupiers of the cinema and school are obliged by law to keep their external areas free of litter,” An Taisce explained.
The IBAL survey revealed a positive overall change for Ireland’s litter problem with 60 per cent of towns now clean to European norms – the highest percentage ever. Thirty-three of the towns surveyed are now as clean as their European neighbours, with some moving from “littered” towns in the previous survey up the table.
