‘Embarrassing and disgraceful’ – State of pollution in Tipperary river prompts calls for action
The state of the river in one town in Tipperary town has been described as an “embarrassment” by a local councillor.
At the September meeting of Tipperary County Council, Thurles councillor Jim Ryan raised the issue of the state of the River Suir in the town, saying that it’s a “disgrace and an embarrassment”.
"The disgraceful, embarrassing and shocking state of the River Suir in Thurles, at one stage it used to be full of swans, ducks and fish, but now it’s full of rubbish, bottles, cans, old shopping trolleys, and raw sewerage,” Cllr Ryan said.
"In some sections, the river is completely overgrown from riverbank to riverbank, I was in Cahir last week and I have to say, the same River Suir is in a beautiful and magnificent state there, particularly by the castle, and if you compare that to the absolutely embarrassing, disgraceful river in Thurles, right in the heart of the town,” he added.
Calling on the council to clean the rubbish out of the river, Cllr Ryan said that it’s the least that could be done.
"At the very least, the council should clean out the rubbish, the bottles and cans, the trolleys and cut back the overgrowth, I’ve never seen the river as bad and the people of Thurles are sick of it,” Cllr Ryan said.
"Every day, people are asking me ‘what is going on with the river?’ will you please go away and clean it out, cut it back and put it back to the state it was years ago, full of otters, fish, ducks, people used to love going down there and sitting by the riverbanks”.
The Thurles-based councillor added that he can’t understand how the river can be so beautiful in Cahir, but in such a poor state in Thurles.
In response, Eamon Lonergan from Tipperary County Council’s environment section said that council scientists are working on figuring out the reason for the overgrowth in the river in Thurles.
"We’re well aware of the issues on the River Suir in Thurles, we have our TCC scientists working with LAWPRO (the local authority waters programme) on that, they want to create a climate action plan, we want to have a proper forum that will drive that plan and that will engage with the various stakeholders,” he explained.
"We are prevented from just going into the stream and doing certain works, we can’t just do that, but we will keep it as part of our plan of what’s going to be done in the immediate term, the short term,” Mr Lonergan added.
Pollution in the river is coming from further upstream, he added, saying that the council will work to get to the source of it and work with everyone involved to make sure the issue is solved.