Swimmers asked to float their ideas

Cork County Council is asking swimmers to help them to determine what beaches, lakes and rivers should be officially identified as bathing waters.

Swimmers are asked to tell the council if they think a location should maintain its existing bathing waters status, or if a new official bathing water designation should be given to an area commonly used for swimming but that has not yet been designated.

Under European and Irish law, Irish local authorities must identify bathing waters each year so that these areas can be monitored to ensure they meet stringent microbiological water quality standards.

In some cases, local authorities focus their resources for providing lifeguards during the summer season at these official bathing areas.

The laws also require that the local authority prepares detailed descriptions for each of the identified bathing water sites describing the bathing area as well as areas in the surface waters catchment area that could be a source of pollution.

Further information on Cork county bathing waters can be found on the beaches section of corkcoco.ie.

To make a submission, the public can use the EPA Guideline document available from the beaches section, which must be completed and returned with supporting documentation in order to make a fuller assessment of any submission.