Thurles Town Leads In Nominations For 5 Coveted National Awards.

Breaking News!

Thurles.Info are proud to inform its readers that Thurles Town has been nominated for no less than five Irish National Awards, for the first time in the Town’s history.

We attempted to contact Ms Sharon Scully (Thurles District Administrator) to announce the news, on Thursday March 14th last, however Ms Scully failed to answer her telephone.

We then attempted to contact Tipperary Co. Council’s Chief Executive Mr Joe MacGrath, however all we got was the usual automated email reply which read; [(Thu, 14th Mar, 11:25) “I am away from my office until Wednesday 20th March, 2024. Please re-send your email to evelyn.harty@tipperarycoco.ie, if this matter requires urgent attention. Since it wasn’t, we didn’t.

Full details of these “Five Irish National Awards”, (much coveted by other competing counties I might add), were contained in a communication delivered by registered post, to the offices of Thurles.Info. today.

The communication received reads as follows:-

Dear Mr. Willoughby,
It is with great pleasure that I, as President of the Pothole Preservation Society of Ireland (PPSI), can inform you that Thurles has swept the boards in our annual “National Pothole Awards Competition”.
As you will be possibly aware the foundation of our Society came about because of the need to maintain the high standard and quality of all road potholes in Ireland, and to recognise and reward those local authorities who contribute to the making of new potholes and who also support the improvement of those already in existence, by not filling them in, thus destroying their original structure and cultural Irish diversity.

You have highlighted the pothole situation on many occasions with fine photographs from your local area and a number of these are now on permanent display in our Library.

As you know, potholes have been an intrinsic part of our heritage for centuries, in fact ever since the invention of the wheel. It is a matter of record that many blacksmiths all over our green and pleasant land, have made a good living, for many years, from the refurbishing of wheels on donkey carts, horse-drawn carriages and caravans, as a result of the careless driving through, rather than around, our nation’s numerous potholes.

Similarly, in modern times, tyre companies have contributed greatly in reducing unemployment figures as they attend to the needs of motorists who fail to recognise the need to avoid potholes at all times, especially at night. Speaking of which, our Society is extremely conscious of the difficulty of this latter point raised, and is presently engaged in active discussion with the Road Safety Authority on the possibility of providing Pothole Warning Lights (PWL), for night-time driving.

Adjudication:

Judging of all the major towns in Ireland has just been completed and, while the final official ratings from our headquarters will not be available for some weeks. Delay is due to the practice by some County Councils, who insist on filling potholes that have already been nominated for an award.

However, I am in a position to inform you that, to-date, Thurles has been awarded first place in all of our major categories.

These categories include:

Highest Overall Number of Potholes.
Lowest Number of Streets with no Potholes.
Highest Number of Potholes impossible to avoid while driving.
Potholes that simply will not vanish.
First-time Potholes Filled In, but still causing serious bumps while driving.

Your town of Thurles is expected to finish top of the list outstripping, by a huge majority, all other leading contenders in their race for National Award recognition.

It is a matter of great pride for our Society to highlight the fact that the municipal authority, within the Thurles Town Municipal District area, has set new standards of preservation with regards non maintenance of potholes in the town and its environs. and have set new standards for others that will be most difficult to emulate into the future.

Yours sincerely,
T. R. McAdam, Honorary Secretary,
(Pothole Preservation Society of Ireland).

Readers please keep your fingers crossed, the race is on.