Boaters have expressed anger at an attempt – apparently by anglers – to restrict moorings at a popular event on the Ashby Canal, writes Harry Arnold.
The Shackerstone Family Festival – on 6/7 September – a major land-based event but with a large boating element has been established for 20 years. This section of the canal is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) which has never been a problem in the past. (Below – boats at Shackerstone – Harry Arnold)
According to the event organisers the Shackerstone Angling Association seems to have had a campaign to frustrate the festival for the past five years, on the basis that they have no room to fish during that weekend.
We understand that this year a local resident – alleged to be a prominent member of the angling community – wrote to Natural England (NE) and complained about the damage to the canal’s reed system caused by boats during the festival.
NE then set a list of conditions to which the festival was required to comply if they were to get permission to hold the event which the Canal & River Trust (CRT) – as the guardian of the Ashby Canal with a legal, and charitable, obligation to manage the SSSI – had to impose.
Various meeting were held and NE agreed to the CRT’s suggestion to install 200m of temporary nico-spanning to protect the plants from wash, thereby allowing double mooring in specific locations.
CRT is confident that these measures will allow sufficient mooring space for the number of boats expected to attend but it may reduce the navigation to a single boat width in some places.
A CRT statement says – “We can assure all boaters that there is no threat to navigation and no proposal to close the canal to boats. The canal was built for boats, and will continue to be enjoyed by boats; however we also have to recognise that it has become an important wildlife habitat and that we have to take a balanced approach”.
We understand that one of the conditions that NE wanted to impose was to ban the discharge of ‘grey water’ – that from boat sinks and showers. A rather worrying thought for future situations such as this.
Thanks to Harry Arnold and Waterway Images for this report and image.