LIMERICK City Centre is the most littered area in the country according to the latest Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) survey.
Slipping to a littered status since last year, the city was the only area branded as “littered”.
Meanwhile, Limerick City South (Galvone) is highlighted as moderately littered in 37th position, out of the 40 towns and cities surveyed.
The An Taisce report on Limerick City Centre said: “A poor result for Limerick City, with just five sites out of 25 sites surveyed getting the top litter grade, and too many heavily littered sites – this will have significantly brought down Limerick’s ranking.”
- External Walls: Up to €8,000 Grant
- Attic: Up to €1,500 Grant
- Cavity Walls: Up to €1,700 Grant
- Internal Dry Lining: Up to €4,500 Grant
While there were some sites which saw improvements, such as the steps by King John’s Castle and 31-32 Cecil Street, the remainder were heavily littered and neglected.
Such areas include Mount Kenneth Place, the entrance to Henry Street car park, the residential area of Grattan Court, a recycling facility on the Dock Road, the laneway at Parnell Street service area and the laneway at Cruises Street car park.
In Lee Estate, remnants of a bonfire were also evident.
The report continued: “There were six top ranking sites in Galvone and one of these included Galvone Industrial Estate – this is certainly worth acknowledging as it had been a heavily littered and dumped upon site over many many years.”
“However, the presence of two very heavily littered sites drags down Galvone’s overall ranking – there was monumental dumping at the Bring Centre, Roxboro Shopping Centre’ and Grasslands at Greenmount Avenue had suffered from not just dumping, but the burning of items, again, on a huge scale.”
No town or city occupied the “seriously littered” or “litter blackspot”, and overall litter levels were on par with last year.
Sligo again topped the IBAL ranking followed by Monaghan, Leixlip, and Waterford, awarded as Ireland’s cleanest city.
Over 20 per cent of litter was made up of plastic bottles and cans, the highest levels since the Deposit Return Scheme was introduced.
Conor Horgan from IBAL said: “If we had hoped that the DRS would see this litter disappear from our streets, it’s not happening. 15c or 25c does not appear enough to incentivise some people to return a bottle or can. That said, by reducing this litter by 50 per cent, the scheme’s impact on overall cleanliness levels is beyond dispute.”
The prevalence of coffee cups was at its highest level since 2023, making it one of the main sources of litter on the streets, behind sweet papers, fast food wrappers, plastic bags, and cigarette butts.