The clean-up after this year’s Twelfth parade in Belfast began on Monday evening, with council staff working tirelessly to return the city’s streets to normal ahead of Tuesday morning’s rush hour.
This year’s parades took place on Monday, July 13, after the Twelfth itself fell on a Sunday.
Pictures seen by the Irish News showed the streets of central Belfast littered with cans, bottles and other debris after the main parade headed southwards from the city centre.
The litter was visible around the Shaftesbury Square area of the city, along the main parade route.
Council workers clear litter in Shaftesbury Square during this year’s Battle of the Boyne commemorations.
PICTURE: BRIAN LINCOLN
The cost of this year’s operation is not yet known, but last year’s clean-up is thought to have cost around £23,000 for street cleaning alone.
That figure did not include the cost of clearing bonfires on council-owned land, while other sites are understood to be a matter for private landowners and roads fall under the remit of the Department for Infrastructure.
The Irish News previously revealed that the Department had spent more than £70,000 over five years cleaning and re-tarring public roads in the aftermath of bonfires, on top of the money paid by the council to clear sites.
Litter in Shaftesbury Square during this year’s Battle of the Boyne commemorations.
PICTURE: BRIAN LINCOLN
Figures previously released under Freedom of Information show the cost of the Twelfth clean-up in the city has consistently topped £20,000 in recent years — £23,302 in 2023, £23,114 in 2022 and £21,198 in 2019.
The bill fell to just £3,178 in 2021, when Covid restrictions curtailed celebrations, and to zero in 2020, when parades did not take place.
Street cleaning after the parades is carried out entirely by council staff, with none of the work outsourced.
The council’s annual citywide street cleansing budget stands at around £13.8 million.
A Belfast City Council spokesperson said: “As with most major events in the city, there is an inevitable increase in litter on the streets on 12 July. Costs associated with street cleaning over this period are included within our annual citywide street cleansing budget.”