Galway City

Fastest Broadband Upload Speeds

There is some interesting data collected at Speedtest.net about broadband speeds in Ireland.
In April 2011 the summary of their Upload speed tests for Ireland showed that Magnet Broadband had the fastest upload speeds out of all the public internet providers. The average upload speed for Magnet was 2.92Mbps. Many people in Ireland would be happy with that as a download speed.

Some smaller local wireless broadband providers did well – with upload speeds of around 2Mbps

Of the bigger internet providers – UPC came in behind Magnet with upload speed averages of  1.63Mbps

Meteor – which is only a mobile broadband  provider did really well with average  upload speed of  1.47Mbps.
Imagine and Digiweb had upload speeds in the tests of 1.12Mbps and

All the mobile broadband suppliers did better than Eircom. (0.53Mbps)
Three 0.86Mbps
O2 - upload speeds 0.83Mbps
Vodafone 0.59 Mbps

Clearwire came out with the slowest upload speeds of just 0.1Mbps

(The Education Network HEANET had  the fastest  upload speed – (19 Mbps !!)  but that is only available in Universities and other educational institutions)

Upload speeds are not as important as download speeds when using the internet – but good upload speeds are usually a good indicator of broadband quality.

According to Speedtest – the Town with the fastest upload speeds in Ireland is  Tralee with 3.93 Mbps  – that is probably because of the Institute of Technology in the town which has high speed broadband.
Dundalk, Kildare, Wicklow, Galway, Waterford, Carlow and Lucan were the next 7 in the best upload speed chart.
Tullamore cane out last with 0.54Mbps

Towns with the Best Broadband Speeds

According to speed tests carried out on Speedtest.net – between Sept 2008 and MArch 20011 these are the Top 10 towns with  fastest internet download speeds in Ireland

1. Lucan 15.33 Mbps
2. Maynooth  12.84 Mbps
3. Celbridge  11.53 Mbps
4. Swords  11.25  Mbps
5. Kilcock 10.76 Mbps
6. Naas  10.73 Mbps
7. Newbridge 10.68 Mbps
8. Carlow 9.39 Mbps
9. Athlone 9.31 Mbps
10. Dublin  8.88Mbps

By comparison – the same speed test site has the top 10 UK towns with average speeds ranging from 21Mbps to 29 Mbps. The top Irish town wouldn’t make it into the top 50 in the UK.

Cork came out with an av speed of 5.54 Mbps while Galway did slightly better with 6.28Mbps.
Tuam was the slowest shown – with av speeds of 1.31 Mbps

For Upload Speeds – these were the top ten Irish towns or cities

1 Dundalk 2.55 Mbps
2 Carlow 2.09 Mbps
3 Wicklow 1.90 Mbps
4 Athlone 1.76 Mbps
5 Lucan 1.70 Mbps
6 Maynooth 1.66 Mbps
7 Waterford 1.46 Mbps
8 Tralee 1.40 Mbps
9 Cavan 1.40 Mbps
10. Tipperary 1.33 Mbps

Overall – on the speedtest site – Ireland ranks in 52nd place. Results were obtained by analyzing test data between Feb 12, 2011 and Mar 13, 2011. Tests from 1,100,532 unique IPs have been taken in this country and of 7,145,506 total tests, 13,914 are being used for the current Index.

County Galway Speed Camera Vans

These are the roads where the mobile speed or safety cameras will be operating from November 2010 in County Galway.

The 45 vans will be covering the whole country – at 600 locations. So dont expect to see a van on the same road every day. You will never know when there could be one round the next bend – so slow down, be safe and save lives.

The full network of speed cameras will not be up and running until Feb 2011 – but they are being rolled out from Nov 2010

Fairtrade Towns in Ireland

The following Irish Towns had Fairtrade status at the end of 2009:

Athlone, Ballymun, Baltinglass, Bandon, Bantry, Belfast, Bray, Carlow, Cashel, Castlebar, Clonakilty, Cork, Dublin, Ennis, Galway, Greystones, Kilkenny, Kinsale, Leighlin, Limerick, Longford, Maynooth, Midleton, Mullingar, Newbridge, Newry, Portlaoise, Roscommon, Roscrea, Skibbereen, Sligo, Thurles,  Tralee, Tubbercurry, Waterford, Westport, Wexford

These towns in Ireland are working towards Fairtrade town status.

Antrim, Athy, Buncrana, Cahir, Carrick On Suir, Clones, Clonmel, Dun Laoghaire, Glanmire, Gort, Leixlip, Mallow, Naas, Nenagh, Schull, Temple Bar, Templemore, Tipperary, Trim, Tuam, Tullamore, Warrenpoint, and Newcastle West

IBAL Litter League Table 2010

IBAL – The Irish Business Against Litter – have released their latest results on the litter in  50 towns and cities in Ireland.

Wexford came out as the cleanest place out of the 50 places in the survey – with Tallaght coming out as the worst Litter Blackspot.
Of course – there could be towns cleaner than Wexford and just as dirty as Tallaght – but only towns with populations over 6000 are included.

Here is the full table of rankings  released in August 2010

1 Wexford Clean to European Norms

2 Longford Clean to European Norms

3 Blanchardstown Clean to European Norms

4 Drogheda Clean to European Norms

5 Carlow Clean to European Norms

6 Trim Clean to European Norms

7 Killarney Clean to European Norms

8 Clonmel Clean to European Norms

9 Ballincollig Clean to European Norms

10 Lucan Clean to European Norms

11 Sligo Clean to European Norms

12 Ennis Clean to European Norms

13 Fermoy Clean to European Norms

14 Dungarvan Clean to European Norms

15 Letterkenny Clean to European Norms

16 Kildare Clean to European Norms

17 Waterford City Clean to European Norms

18 Cavan Clean to European Norms

19 Dun Laoghaire Clean to European Norms

20 Dundalk Clean to European Norms

21 Bray Clean to European Norms

22 Kilkenny Clean to European Norms

23 Tullamore Clean to European Norms

24 Tralee Clean to European Norms

25 Ballinasloe Clean to European Norms

26 Arklow Clean to European Norms

27 Mallow Clean to European Norms

28 Galway City Moderately Littered

29 Dublin City Moderately Littered

30 Newcastlewest Moderately Littered

31 Enniscorthy Moderately Littered

32 Swords Moderately Littered

33 Tramore Moderately Littered

34 Roscommon Moderately Littered

35 Mullingar Moderately Littered

36 Cork City Moderately Littered

37 Youghal Moderately Littered

38 Cobh Moderately Littered

39 Navan Moderately Littered

40 Tuam Moderately Littered

41 Wicklow Moderately Littered

42 Ballina Moderately Littered

43 Nenagh Moderately Littered

44 Newbridge Littered

45 Castlebar Littered

46 New Ross Littered

47 Monaghan Littered

48 Athlone Littered

49 Limerick City Littered

50 Midleton Seriously Littered

51 Naas Seriously Littered

52 Portlaoise Litter Blackspot

53 Tallaght Litter Blackspot

Cleanest and Dirtiest Towns Ireland

Yet another litter survey by  IBAL  . The 2009 results were released today (Jan 4th 2010)  The  litter survey covers 60 towns with  over 6,000 population . Sites are graded by An Taisce according to international standards.

The cleanest town was Bray – whilst the two dirtiest were Limerick and Wicklow.

IBAL Anti Litter League Final Results 2009

1 Bray

2 Cavan

3 Drogheda

4 Clonmel

5 Longford

6 Wexford

7 Carlow

8 Sligo

9 Celbridge

10 Blanchardstown

11 Ballincollig

12 Dundalk

13 Mullingar

14 Trim

15 Portlaoise

16 Navan

17 Roscommon

18 Dún Laoghaire

19 Tramore

20 Shannon

21 Killarney

22 Leixlip

23 Dungarvan

24 Ballina

25 Castlebar

26 Kilkenny

27 Fermoy

28 Swords

29 Balbriggan

30 Newbridge

31 Newcastlewest

32 Midleton

33 Ashbourne

34 Thurles

35 Enniscorthy

36 Youghal

37 Monaghan

38 Lucan

39 Cobh

Moderately Littered

40 Waterford City

41 Buncrana

42 Tullamore

43 Arklow

44 Gorey

45 Galway

46 Ennis

47 Tuam

48 Tralee

49 New Ross

Littered

50 Cork City

51 Dublin City

52 Naas

53 Nenagh

Seriously Littered

54 Ballinasloe

55 Tallaght

56 Letterkenny

57 Athlone

58 Mallow

Litter Blackspots

59 Wicklow

60 Limerick City

Litter problems in some Irish Towns

The IBAL 2009 results were published this week – IBAL is the Irish Business Against Litter. Certain towns are checked for litter during the year by An Taisce on behalf of IBAL . All towns in Ireland of over 6,000 inhabitants are now covered by the Anti Litter League . Sixty towns in all were surveyed – the best town (cleanest) was Wexford

Top Ten Cleanest Towns 2009

1 Wexford
2 Ennis
3 Youghal
4 Carlow
5 Dun Laoghaire
6 Swords
7 Balbriggan
8 Longford
9 Roscommon
10 Killarney
Two towns came out as the worst  in the survey this year – they were  Mallow and Athlone – both were classed as Litter Blackspots.

Arklow was the the third worst – classed as Seriously Littered .
Other towns that did badly (classed as littered)

45 Buncrana
46 Dublin City
47 Cork City
48 Limerick City
49 Nenagh
50 Naas
51 Kilkenny
52 Waterford City
53 Portlaoise
54 Trim
55 Wicklow
56 Gorey
57 Tallaght

Top Secondary Schools in Connacht 2008

According to the Sunday Times league table of the top secondary schools in Ireland 2008 – these are the top 20 schools in Connacht. The positions are based on entry to third level institutions only – so may not be a very accurate assessment of a school. (Pupils may have taken Grinds elsewhere). In the absence of any government assessment  of school performance in Ireland – it is all we have to go on and is better than nothing at all.  There are no published figures or exam results for schools in Ireland – mainly because teachers are against it. Maybe if we saw exam results some  teachers might not stay in their jobs .
(M=Mixed, B=Boys, G= Girls)
The figure shown next to each school is thepercentage of Leaving Cert pupils entering third level in Ireland.

1 Scoil Damhnait, Achill, Co Mayo M 7 84.6
2 Seamount College, Kinvara, Co Galway G 76.2
3 * Marian College, Mohill, Co Leitrim M 75.0
4 Mount St Michael, Claremorris, Co Mayo G 74.5
5 Jesus & Mary Secondary School,Salthill, Galway G 70.4
6 Colaiste Iognaid SJ, Sea Rd, Galway M 70.0
7 Ursuline College, Sligo G 69.6
8 Colaiste na Coiribe, Tuam Road, Galway M 67.7
9 Presentation College, Athenry, Co Galway M 63.8
10 Scoil Muire gan Smal, Roscommon G 61.7
11 Holy Rosary College, Mountbellew, Co Galway M 60.5
12 Dominican College, Taylor’s Hill, Galway G 60.3
13 Scoil Mhuire, Ballinasloe, Co Galway G 60.0
14 St Mary’s Secondary School, Ballina, Co Mayo G 58.7
15 St Joseph’s College, Nun’s Island, Galway B 58.3
16 St Gerald’s College, Castlebar, Co Mayo B 57.5
17 Colaiste Cholmain, Claremorris, Co Mayo B 54.9
18 Colaiste Cholmcille, Inverin, Co Galway M 53.1
19 Sligo Grammar School, The Mall, Sligo M 52.8
20 Presentation College, Tuam, Co Galway G 52.7

Best Secondary Schools in Ireland.

Each year the Irish Times puts together some figures of each secondary school’s Leaving Cert students and combines them with figures from Third Level institutions in Ireland . . The Universities and Colleges record which school the first year students were enrolled at in the previous year. The two sets of figures combined give us some idea of the percentages of Leaving Cert students from each school that are entering Third Level education in Ireland. A league table is produced of all the secondary schools in Ireland . Of course – these figures are not a full indication of a schools’ performance – but it is all we have. The figures don’t include students who go on to Universities outside the Republic of Ireland. But in the absence of any Irish Government school performance figures – it is all we have to help pick out schools that might be better or worse than others at preparing students for qualifying for entry to University or other 3rd level education.

See here for the Best Schools Ireland 2011 according to the Sunday Times

The 2007 figures showed a few schools with 100% of Leaving Cert pupils going on to third level in Ireland.

Coláiste Iosagain, Stillorgan, Co Dublin
Yeats College, Galway
Jesus & Mary Secondary School, Salthill, Galway
St Joseph’s, Nun’s Island, Galway
Tralee Community College, Co Kerry
St Francis Capuchin College, Rochestown, Cork
Scoil Na Mbraithre, Charleville, Co Cork
Coláiste Eoin, Stillorgan, Co Dublin
Colaiste Na Coiribe, Tuam Rd, Galway
Institute of Education, Dublin 2
CBS, Mitchelstown, Co Cork
Holy Rosary College, Mountbellew, Co Galway
Scoil Mhuire, Sydney Place, Cork
Colaiste Mhuire, Ballygar, Co Galway
St Ita’s, Abbeyfeale, Co Limerick
Coláiste Iascaigh, Easkey, Co Sligo

Galway and Cork schools seemed to do well in this schools league table .

Other top schools with over 90% entry to Irish 3rd level institutions

Blackrock College, Co Dublin
Scoil Mhuire, Carrick On Suir, Co Tipperary
Mount Mercy College, Cork
Loreto High School, Beaufort, Dublin 14
St Joseph of Cluny, Killiney, Co Dublin
Loreto, Foxrock, Dublin 18
Gaelcholaiste Cheatharlach, Easca, Carlow
Hamilton High School, Bandon, Co Cork
Gonzaga College, Dublin 6
CBC, Monkstown, Co Dublin
Scoil Damhnait, Achill, Co Mayo
Laurel Hill Coláiste FCJ, Limerick
Mount Anville School, Dublin 14
Colaiste An Phiarsaigh, Glanmire, Cork
St Vincent’s, Dundalk, Co Louth
Loreto College, St. Stephens Green, Dublin 2
Tarbert Comprehensive, Co Kerry
Presentation College, Mardyke, Cork
Terenure College, Dublin 6w
Glenstal Abbey, Co Limerick
The Teresian School, Dublin 4
Summerhill College, Sligo
L. S. U., Our Lady’s Bower, Athlone, Co Westmeath
Mean Scoil Na Toirbhirte, An Daingean, Co Kerry
St Mary’s College, Rathmines, Dublin 6
Mount St Michael, Claremorris, Co Mayo
Clochar Loreto, Letterkeny, Co Donegal
CBS, Roscommon
Muckross Park College, Dublin 4
Community School, Dunmore, Tuam, Co Galway
Coláiste Choilm, Ballincollig, Co Cork
St Andrew’s College, Blackrock, Co Dublin
Colaiste Iognaid, Galway
Presentation Secondary, Listowel, Co Kerry
St Gerard’s, Bray, Co Wicklow
Ursuline College, Finisklin, Sligo
Colaiste Choilm, Tullamore, Co Offaly
Gaelcholaiste Chiarrai, Tralee, Co Kerry
Ardscoil Mhuire, Ballinasloe, Co. Galway
Cistercian College, Roscrea, Co. Tipperary
Sandford Park School, Dublin 6
St. Louis Community School, Kiltimagh, Co. Mayo
Ard Scoil Phobal Bheanntrai, Bantry, Co Cork
Coláiste Daibhéid, An T-Ardán Theas, Corcaigh

2011 Top Schools in Ireland

Dirty Old Towns…

Most of the date used on this site is from the Census – but a recent interesting  litter survey was published on all towns in Ireland with more than 6000 population.
The littering survey ranked the 50 towns in order of cleanest first, The full table is shown below (From the Irish Business Against Litter). Sligo came out worst (dirtiest) and Dundalk came out the best (cleanest)

1. Dundalk “Litter Free”
2. Cavan “Litter Free”
3. Fermoy “Litter Free”
4. Trim “Litter Free”
5. Killarney “Litter Free”
6. Monaghan “Litter Free”
7. Carlow “Litter Free”
8. Galway City “Litter Free”
9. Youghal “Litter Free”
10. Bray “Litter Free”
11. Letterkenny “Litter Free”
12. Ballina “Litter Free”
13. Naas “Litter Free”
14. Roscommon “Litter Free”
15. Thurles “Litter Free”
16. Drogheda “Litter Free”
17. Athy “Litter Free”
18. Waterford City “Litter Free”
19. Midleton “Litter Free”
20. Wexford “Litter Free”
21. Arklow “Litter Free”
22. Castlebar “Litter Free”

23. Swords “Moderately Littered”
24. Ballinasloe “Moderately Littered”
25. Maynooth “Moderately Littered”
26. Kilkenny “Moderately Littered”
27. Greystones “Moderately Littered”
28. Tralee “Moderately Littered”
29. Portlaoise “Moderately Littered”
30. Gorey “Moderately Littered”
31. Ennis “Moderately Littered”
32. Leixlip “Moderately Littered”
33. Longford “Moderately Littered”
34. Limerick City “Moderately Littered”
35. Cobh “Moderately Littered”
36. Clonmel “Moderately Littered”

37. Dungarvan “Littered”
38. Wicklow “Littered”
39. Tullamore “Littered”
40. Mullingar “Littered”
41. Newbridge “Littered”
42. Navan “Littered”

43. Athlone “Seriously Littered”
44. Dun Laoghaire “Seriously Littered”
45. Cork City “Seriously Littered”
46. Enniscorthy “Seriously Littered”

47. Mallow “Litter Blackspot”
48. Tallaght “Litter Blackspot”
49. Nenagh “Litter Blackspot”
50. Sligo “Litter Blackspot”