Buncrana is Donegal's tidiest town with national awards for Dungloe and Castlefin

Buncrana took pride of place at the SuperValu TidyTowns awards, scooping the North West and West Large Town Regional award, while there were also national prizes for Dungloe and Castlefin.

The North West and West Large Town area covers all of Cavan, Donegal, Leitrim, Monaghan, Sligo, Galway, Mayo, Roscommon with the Inishowen town winning €1,000, also making it Donegal’s tidiest town.

In the Sustainable Development Goals award, Dungloe were the youth category winner and Castlefin were a special award winner, sponsored by Bat Conservation Ireland.

With Buncrana the county and Gold Medal Winner, Letterkenny was named second in the Donegal county awards and Carrigart finished in third place. Other bronze medal winners from Donegal were Glenties, Raphoe and Moville, with Gola Island the Endeavour Award winner.

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Over 750 TidyTowns volunteers were present at the SuperValu TidyTowns awards ceremony at the RDS in Dublin.

Trim, Co Meath, was named Ireland’s Tidiest Large Town for 2022, an award previously won by Donegal towns Glenties - in 1958, 1959, 1960, 1962 and 1995 - Malin in 1970 and 1991 and Letterkenny in 2015. 

Rosscarbery, Co Cork, is Ireland’s Tidiest Village, with Clonakilty, Co Cork, Ireland’s Tidiest Small Town and Ennis, Co Clare, Ireland's Tidiest Large Urban Centre.

"Tidy Towns is a tremendous initiative and amplifies the sense of community in our towns and villages,” said Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine and Donegal TD, Charlie McConalogue.

“Huge congratulations to all Donegal winners including Buncrana which was crowned as Donegal's Tidiest Town and winner of the All-Ireland Pollinator Plan in a large town category and to Castlefinn for claiming the Bat Conservation Ireland Award. Congrats to all groups that received funding today too, Donegal received one of the highest allocations and this is a testament to the hard work and dedication of all our volunteers. A special thanks to Supervalu for its ongoing support of the initiative."

Donegal is one of the highest funded counties under a special allocation of €1.4 million nationally in funding to support the work of individual TidyTowns Groups. The funding of over €60,000 for Donegal will assist Donegal groups in their continued efforts to enhance their towns and villages. This is the sixth consecutive year that funding has been provided.