The body charged with overseeing the city centre has told Derry City Council that a lack of public toilets in the area may be harming the city’s reputation among tourists.
The comments came at a recent meeting where the City Centre Initiative (CCI) gave councillors an update on the recent Purple Flag award received by Derry, which is an award scheme that recognises excellence in the management of both towns and city centres, and areas that offer a better standard of night out to visitors in terms of safety and care.
Addressing Thursday afternoon’s meeting of council’s Environmental Services Committee, Jim Roddy of the City Centre Initiative (CCI) paid tribute to the contribution of council to the award, particularly the city’s cleansing department.
He added that the assessment for the Purple Flag had taken place in November of last year, and judges had been particularly impressed by the appearance of the city the next morning.
However, Mr Roddy (pictured above) added that the lack of public conveniences within the city had become an issue of concern.
His comments came after the SDLP’s Thomas Conway asked what more council could do to improve the image of the city.
Responding, Mr Roddy said that the lack of toilets had been noted by the Purple Flag assessors, and called on council to now look at the issue as a matter of priority.
“We have to move beyond the attitude that you can’t do it because of the problems that might be associated with people hanging around, we have to be more mature, more European about this,” he said.
 

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