Ireland’s waterways are not getting fair treatment

The early years of my life as a reporter in The Connacht Tribune revolved a lot around water pollution – even though I did not realise its full import at the time.

One of the big running stories in the Tribune during my three years there was a protracted political wrangle over the Mutton Island wastewater treatment centre.

The row split the City Council. One faction wanted the secondary treatment facility to be built as quickly as possible.

The immediate irritant was a phenomenon known as the “Claddagh Pong” which occurred whenever there was fine weather, or when there was a neap tide, or when the water levels were low.

The other side did not want it built in Mutton Island at all. They said it would ruin the island and its historic lighthouse, that the causeway would be clogged by lorry traffic, and a better solution would be to run the sewerage system out to near the City Dump on Carrowbrowne, where a secondary treatment facility could be built.

That row sucked up so much energy and so much time and caused so much conflict.

The context behind it all was this. Raw sewage was being discharged from the city into Galway Bay. At the time, around 1990, the population was about 60,000. That was a disgrace and a scandal.

Unsurprisingly, the faecal coliform readings in the Bay at the time were sky high. When people went swimming in Salthill or Blackrock, they were essentially having a dip in the sewer.

Over 30 years later, the problem in Galway city might have been finally sorted but the same can’t be said for all population centres in the county.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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