Frustrated locals in West Cork have renamed Shannonvale Park to ‘Uisce Éireann Park’.

This comes after 27 years of the park being unusable due to environmental issues, including a bad smell emanating from a septic tank.

Uisce Éireann says it is working to provide a long-term solution for Shannonvale Park while the Environmental Protection Agency continues to investigate the situation.

In response, the group Clean Water Clonakilty has formed to demand government action on the park.

They have erected a sign renaming the amenity to ‘Uisce Éireann Park’ to express their frustration.

'You can smell it'

Group member Jack Hanly said living near the park is disgusting.

“You can smell it quite bad,” he said.

“The people here have to close all their windows because of the number of flies around the septic tank and obviously it just looks absolutely disgraceful.

“You know, look at it and I think if you compare it even with 10 years ago it just looks hideous.”

Signs erected blocking public access to Shannolvale Park.

Mr Hanly called for Government intervention.

“Minister [Darragh] O'Brien himself visited the park in 2022 and promised funding for this, and no funding has come to fruition,” he said.

“We would like them to actually fund the project and to connect this septic tank to the sewage mains and give us our park back because I think residents of Clonakilty are really concerned by this and have been for a long time.”

The park is often said to be flooded by up to four inches of wastewater and is situated less than 100m away from the Argideen River.