DCC will now be cleaning and inspecting the site daily due to passers-by leaving tomatoes, ketchup, tomato soup, tins of tomatoes, candles and other items on the Drumcondra Bridge.
A spokesperson from DCC told the Irish Independent: “Dublin City Council are aware of food being presented on Drumcondra bridge and will be cleaning and inspecting the site daily.
“It is asked that food is not discarded and wasted in this manner.”
Their statement comes as the spot became internet-famous over the last week, after a TikTok user posted a photo of some cherry tomatoes that someone had littered on the bridge wall. They had frozen in last week’s cold weather.
Both locals and tourists are now making the tongue-in-cheek pilgrimage to Dublin’s “Cherry Tomato Bridge” – or, as it’s called on Google Maps, “the Shrine of the Sacred Cherry Tomatoes of Drumcondra”.
Within the first 24 hours, hundreds of people had visited the bridge to take videos and photos for their social media accounts, or to leave their own “ode to the tomato.”
Local woman Trish Close told the Irish Independent yesterday that “everyone’s talking and stopping [at the bridge], it’s magical, it’s community”.
“I found out about the tomatoes on a social media group called Drumcondra Social. Someone wrote that it’s quite a magical place, others wrote it was quite ridiculous,” she said.
Katie McCarthy, Mary Bolger, Seren Gillard and Carlie O’Connor at the Cherry Tomato Bridge. Photo: Tom Honan
“We’re out for a walk, so we’re passing by. Someone left tomatoes here in the bad weather last week, like rubbish, and they froze. Since then, people have been adding to it.”
The tomatoes have also captured the imagination of a tourist from Zimbabwe who took time to visit the bridge.
“I’m visiting from Zimbabwe. I saw the TikToks and I’m staying nearby so I came to see the cherry tomatoes,” said the man, who called himself Matty.
“I went to the Phoenix Park, but surprisingly this is something new, so far my favourite thing is the ‘Cherry Tomato Bridge’. Everyone is talking about it, it’s trending.”
Last night the tomatoes adorning the bridge had been knocked off the wall and down onto the railway tracks by persons unknown.
Now the city’s council are asking people not to discard food in this manner.
The trend may have hit other bridges around the world, as a video of cherry tomatoes being left on the wall of Brooklyn Bridge was gaining traction on TikTok yesterday.
