Carrigaline Tidy Towns
What a year 2018 has been for Carrigaline Tidy Towns! A National Tidy Towns Gold Medal, a National Clean Air Award, Best Project in a Large Town award at the Muintir Na Tire Pride in Community Awards, Second Place in the Cork County Litter League Awards and to top it off a GAA Spirit of the Community Award. Carrigaline Tidy Towns is organised and run by a committee who are proud of the place in which they live. The dedication of this committee and volunteers has resulted in continuous improvements to the local townscape and a great deal of planning, preparation and hard work resulted in these achievements.
Jack White & Vincent O’Donovan of The Carrigdhoun Newspaper, seated left & right, presenting an award to Pat Murray of the Stables Bar, Carrigaline, for having the Overall Best Business Front, in Carrigaline Tidy Towns Awards. Included at rear, from left, Maura Allen ; Liam O’Connor ; Kevin Meaney ; Conor Phelan ; Geraldine O’Hara and Betty O’Riordan. (Picture: Adrian O’Herlihy)
Below is an overview of this year’s National Tidy Towns judicator report. It gives an overview of the different areas we get judged on each year:
National Tidy Towns Judicator Report Summary 2018 (See online edition) – http://subscriber.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/subscribe.aspx?eid=c946bff2-f434-4a7b-a75d-621998d7e750
Some of this year’s projects included enhancements on the Main Street (new planters / more colour on the Main Street), tree planting of native species in the town as part of National Tree Week and a new Biodiversity garden was established in the park with pollinator friendly planting. The new seated area “Bumblebee Plaza” was enhanced on the Main Street as part of our commitment to the All-Ireland Pollinator Plan. We also participated in the Council’s Streetscape Painting and Signage Improvement Scheme which saw some buildings on the Main Street get a facelift. A new dog poo waste bin was installed in the park and a collection of old ceramic pottery was carried out in September. One of our big awareness campaigns this year was highlighting the issue of discarded cigarette butts. The purpose of this initiative was to measure the extent to which the action of discarding a cigarette butt on the street was occurring and to highlight that fact that, despite a reduction in general waste being discarded, a culture still exists where throwing your cigarette butt on the street is considered an acceptable norm. A norm which occurred 6,150 times, at least, over a four-week period in July on the Main Street.
2018 has spawned a plethora of new additional initiatives for Carrigaline Tidy Towns. We updated our Heritage Map and created a YouTube clip which illustrated a number of the heritage sites in and around Carrigaline town. We introduced a Community Herb Garden on Main Street, a simple recycled pallet hosting a range of planted herbs. A proud and sentimental project saw the establishment of a seating area in the park, an amenity in memory of our Treasurer John Crowley. We held a school’s poster competition on Pollination and Climate Change in May in the Carrigaline Court Hotel.
The efforts of volunteers were recognised on a national level with Supervalu filming their promotional advertisements for tidy towns in and around the town in April; RTE and social media campaign featuring some of our volunteers.
We are delighted to witness a large increase in the number of volunteers this year, a team that has worked tirelessly to ensure that Carrigaline reaches its potential. 2019 is gearing up to be a busy year with many projects in the pipeline. Two new woodland areas are being planned, three new beehives have been just installed, joint projects with residents’ associations, a project on the history and biodiversity of the Owenabue River and some enhancements in the park.
Our success to date would not have been possible without the help and assistance of the clubs, schools, local businesses, and residents’ association. We would especially like to thank the Council for the funding we receive each year and Barry Collins SuperValu, our main sponsor.
In 2018, we surpassed our previous year’s result in the National Town Competition by an increase of 8 marks. We will be hoping that the projects planned for 2019 will further improve our marks aiding our endeavour to win the National Tidy Towns County Award for Cork South; a coveted prize currently in the hands of our neighbours Ballincollig Tidy Towns with a very narrow gap of 14 marks separating us.
The foundation and success of any Tidy Towns group is cemented in the effort, time and energy that volunteers selflessly give to enhancing and improving their own town. We are blessed in Carrigaline with an incredible team of volunteers, without whom the above initiatives would not be possible – Thank you!
Carrigaline has the potential to compete with the very best of Irish towns and there is no reason why we could not, one day, win the overall national Award, winning the title of “Irelands Tidiest Town”.
Your New Year’s resolution – Join Tidy Towns in 2019!
Liam O’Connor -Chairman – Carrigaline Tidy Towns
087 7817857
www.carrigalinetidytowns.com
Twitter: @CarrigalineTT
Facebook: Carrigaline Tidy Town
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