Tidy Towns volunteers from across Louth celebrated an impressive haul of awards – including four gold medals – at the SuperValu Tidy Towns Awards ceremony, held in Croke Park on Friday afternoon.
Blackrock were the big winners of the day picking up a Gold Medal while also being named the Tidiest Small Town in Ireland.
The town scored an impressive 385 points with the adjudicator impressed with the many fine developments that have made the village a fine place in which to live and visit.
”It is always a pleasure to visit Blackrock whether for business or pleasure and this year’s adjudication visit was no exception. Thank you for Blackrock’s continued participation since 1993 in the SuperValu National Tidy Towns Competition, it has presented a wonderful opportunity to witness the many fine developments that have made the village a fine place in which to live and visit; achievements to date are exemplary.”
Blackrock were one of four gold medal winners from Louth with Dundalk, Drogheda and Dromiskin also picking up Gold. This was Dromiskin’s first ever gold medal and a testament to all the hard work that has been put in locally throughout the year by volunteers. The report for the village described it as ‘a beautiful village with a multi-faceted heritage which is effectively presented to the local and wider communities in creative and informative ways!’.
Dundalk increased their mark by 14 points from last year earning a very impressive 371 points (four more than Drogheda). The adjudicator described Dundalk as a ‘very vibrant and youthful town’.
“Dundalk appears to be a very vibrant and youthful town where everyone plays their part in maintaining the environment to the highest standard for both people and pollinators. The commitment to making the town inclusive for all is excellent and we look forward to your progress in this respect,” read the concluding remarks for the Dundalk report.
Also drawing a huge cheer at the awards show were volunteers from Tallanstown and Carlingford who secured silver and bronze medals respectively.
Speaking to the Dundalk Leader, Dundalk Tidy Towns chairperson, Helen Byrne was understandably thrilled following confirmation that Dundalk had received a Gold Medal at this year’s awards (their 14th in total since forming in 2006)
“It was nervewracking as you don’t know what you are going to get until they put the names of the award winners on the screen. They do them in reverse order in each section so when we didn’t see our names on the screen for the Bronze and Silver medals we knew we’d retained our gold,” explained a delighted Helen.
“Only three committee members are allowed to travel to the awards so myself, Triona Tuite and Bernadetee Kellett were in Croke Park representing Dundalk Tidy Towns.
“It’s nice to get some recognition for all the hard work our committee members and volunteers do. We have eight on the committee and about twenty volunteers as well as Tús workers who do great work keeping our town clean. This is our 14th gold medal since we began in 2006 and we also have a silver. All the medals can be viewed in the lobby of the museum in Dundalk. Without the support from the fantastic people of Dundalk we couldn’t achieve this for our town so a big thank you to everybody for all their words of encouragement throughout the year,” added Helen.
