IWA Cambridge Ouse News Spring 2019

Great Ouse Branch

Ouse News - Spring 2019

Newsletter covering the Great Ouse and tributaries Contents: Branch Committee

p2

Branch News

p3

ChairmanÂ’s Corner

p4

North Lodge Pavilion p6 Regional Chairman

p7

Quiz Night

p9

Rescue Practice

p11

Water Safety PÂ’ship p13 EA Volunteer Scheme p15 Outing to Jordans Mill, Biggleswade Join us on Saturday, 23rd March Details on Page 24

Campaigning for the conservation, use, maintenance, restoration and development of the Inland Waterways.

Carry on Camping

p17

Gt River Race

p19

River News

p26

The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the Inland Waterways Association or of the Great Ouse Branch. They are, however, published as being of interest to our members and readers.

Ouse News Page 2 Great Ouse Branch Committee: Committee members may be contacted by email: e.g. an.other@waterways.org.uk Chairman: Keith Alderton Tel : 01366 727236

Volunteer Co-ordinator: Gail Mead Tel: 01359 232603

Secretary: John Hodgson Tel : 01234 344884

Member: Stephen Foote Tel: 01763 838936

Treasurer: Enid Hodgson Tel : 01234 344884

Member: Derek Bradley Tel: 01353 661601

Ouse News Editor: Carole Alderton Tel : 01366 727236 Membership Officer: Peter Webb Tel: 01353 658581

We are a small, friendly group and would welcome another committee member to help us organise meetings and events.

Please contact the editor.

(Authorised to examine all private boats and in addition, residential boats provided they are fitted with a gas bubble tester) Additional contact : Ely Boat Chandlers 01353 663095

Ouse News Page 3

Branch News Winter Meetings are at 8.00 pm at the North Lodge Pavilion, North Lodge Park, Milton, CB24 6UD. T HURSDAY 28 TH F EBRUARY

2019

An illustrated talk on The River Great Ouse from Ely to Denver by Mike Petty, Cambridgeshire Researcher, Lecturer and Historian.

S ATURDAY 23 RD M ARCH

2019

Visit to Jordans Mill. Details on page 24.

T HURSDAY 28 TH M ARCH

2019

This will be our branch Annual General Meeting, together with an update from the Environment Agency.

S ATURDAY 4 TH M AY 2019 Gathering of boats at Reach, followed by an evening meal at the Black Horse, Swaffham Bulbeck.

Book your place for a meal with Stephen Foote - tel: 01763 838936.

We welcome the following new members to the branch. We hope you will introduce yourselves to us when coming to an event or meeting: Emma Morgan, Ely Christopher Carter, Dersingham, King s Lynn

Members who have moved to the branch: Richard & Sandra Avern, Chesterfield, Derbyshire Geoffrey Doggett, Harleston, Norfolk

M ONDAY 6 TH M AY

2019

IWA stand at Reach Fair.

S UNDAY 5 TH M AY 2019

S UNDAY 7 TH J ULY 2019

DIY Barbecue and get together , Reach Hythe. (If sufficient support and weather permitting)

IWA stand at Ely Aquafest.

Ouse News Page 4

Chairman s Corner Welcome to 2019. At the time of writing, the first snowdrops are beginning to show as we look forward to another boating year. Let us hope that we don t get a return dose of last year s beast from the east to spoil our spring activities!

We kick off the outdoor season on Saturday 23rd March with a visit to the historic Jordans Mill on the River Ivel near Biggleswade (see page 24).

For many years the mill produced Jordan s famous cereal products but has now been transformed into a working museum and visitor attraction complete with catering facilities. Please contact me a.s.a.p. if you and your friends wish to join us.

Next on the agenda is Reach Fair, held over the Early Spring Bank Holiday.

We try and get as many boats as possible to make the journey up Reach Lode in order to emphasise to the EA that the navigation is still in regular use and forms a vital part of our statutory waterway network. All are welcome to enjoy a dinner at a local pub on Saturday 4th May (contact Stephen Foote for details). If enough people manage to get their boats up the Lode we will have a get together and DIY barbecue at the head of navigation on Sunday 5th May. We will then be manning our stand at the fair on Monday 6th May. We have, once again, followed our usual practice of providing all of the documents relating to the branch AGM on the 28th March in a separate leaflet for you to peruse in advance of the meeting. This should facilitate a swift execution of the necessary formalities and provide the maximum time for the River Managers of the Environment Agency to present their annual report on the state of our local navigations. Your attendance at the AGM would be much appreciated.

Ouse News Page 5 A major concern nationally has been the continued steady fall-off in membership. Locally we have fared a little better, only losing one or two members a month. Fortunately, we did manage to recruit 16 new members at the Festival of Water and I am pleased to welcome them to the branch and hope they will feel that they would like to get involved. Declining membership seems to be a feature of all such organisations in recent times. However, media interest in waterways has never been higher with thousands of viewers enjoying watching Tim & Pru crunch their way around our canals.

So what is the problem? Is it just that people are too busy staring at their electronic devices to notice what is going on around them in the great outdoors? We as a branch are trying to reverse the trend by involving children in our WOW (Wild about Waterways) activities at local events. Whilst the children are engaged in playing with our model lock we can talk to the parents about our waterways heritage. If you have a view on this or any other subject please send an email or letter to the editor.

Throughout the past year we have held our winter meetings at North Lodge Pavilion. This has proved to be a vast improvement on Coles Road Community Centre, both in the quality of the venue and the fact that we have the place to ourselves and are not disturbed by noise from other users. However some people have had difficulty finding the place as the postcode has not yet been included in some satnav programmes. The simplest way to find us is to travel north through Milton until you see the turning next to the Nokia building on your right. The pavilion is at the very end of the road called North Lodge Park.

Have a great boating season!

Keith Alderton

Ouse News Page 6 Further to the Chairman s comments on the previous page, Peter Webb writes: We have had several comments about finding our new meeting place at North Lodge Pavilion.

North Lodge Pavilion, North Lodge Park, Milton has been built as part of a new housing development, on what was once the Eastern Electricity Board headquarters.

Most maps still do not show all the new estate; some may show the new roads but most satellite views are of the old Eastern Electricity grounds.

Satnavs are also very unreliable as the postcode areas are not precise as yet. Google searches for the house opposite can bring up the postcode location as CB24 6UD or CB24 6UB but using either of these in most satnavs can send you to an incorrect location.

To find on a map use: Grid reference TL 48342 62902 (TL483629) Or use a website called What3words.com (or App What3words ) which divides the world into 3m squares with each given a unique 3 word description. The pavilion has the location description as: prefix.shopping.cyber.

Some mapping programmes use What3words but I am not sure if any satnav devices can be set with the description.

Hopefully most devices should direct you to the correct place by entering Latitude and Longitude i.e. 52.244311, 0.171318 It would be very interesting to learn from members what results they get from their devices.

Peter Webb

Ouse News Page 7 Chris Howes, Eastern Region Chairman: Let s talk about fibreglass cruisers and steel narrowboats, and why we should all muck in and get on together.

A respected senior member of this branch likes to tease me about my cigar tube , while promoting his margarine tub . I know this is only a bit of friendly banter.

However, my hackles started to rise when I read a 2018 edition of GOBA News which questioned why any cruiser owner would support the Bedford and Milton Keynes link, as it would bring more narrowboats onto their waters!

Then, when I was giving a talk to a group of retired former cruiser owners about the proposed Boston to Peterborough Wetland Corridor, the subject of non-compatibility between boat types raised its ugly head again. We don t want more boats on the Great Ouse I was told. They take our moorings, fill our locks and steal our services .

The fact is, there s plenty of room on these waters for all of us! The two proposed links (at opposite ends of our network) will increase the range of destinations available to us. A few more boats coming into the area will increase income for the EA to reinvest in facilities, moorings and dredging.

Increased traffic will benefit local river orientated businesses, bringing them more custom, and contributing to the vitality of the economic health of the area - helping keep the little shops and the pubs open for business. Also, increased use of the waters generally reduces the problems of silting up and weed growth.

During the summer of 2018 over 100 boats attended the Festival of Water in St Neots. At least 80 had come over from the canals. I was on the Ouse (and tributaries) continuously from the end of May until early September.

Ouse News Page 8 I always found there were plenty of moorings for everyone, even with the increased boat numbers due to the Festival. In my narrowboat I frequently shared locks with cruisers, and we all got on perfectly well with each other, chatting, laughing, and sharing locking duties between us. On two occasions I rescued fibreglass cruisers that had either become stuck, or had broken down on the Old West River by using my narrowboat s weight and power to tow them; one off a shallow corner, the other to a boatyard.

During the summer I did a radio interview in Cambridge (to promote FoW) and the young lass interviewing asked me Is there a camaraderie amongst boaters like there is amongst motorcyclists - where you all help each other out ? . Proudly I replied Yes .

We all share the same enthusiasms - waking to the gentle lapping of water on the hull, the dappled reflection of light off the water, the sun burning through the morning mist to herald another glorious day afloat. We all share the same aspirations - good moorings, properly working locks, clean and frequent services, well dredged and weed free waters. These are the things we should be campaigning together for, not dividing us into different tribes !

Chris Howes Regional Chairman

News & Views Do you have an article, comment or photo you would like to share? We would be very pleased to receive it!

Please email the editor: carolealderton@sky.com

Ouse News Page 9 Quiz Night held on 22nd November 2018 Our meeting on the 22nd November was a Quiz and a Fish & Chip Supper. It was good to see new members there!

When people first arrived they ordered their Fish & Chips for delivery later.

Soon the members had organised into groups and given themselves some amusing team names. A picture round was given to them to name premarked rivers and canals. This was followed by trivia questions loosely based on a journey from The Wash to Cambridge along the Great Ouse and its tributaries. Timing was quite good and we had finished and marked the round just as the supper arrived. After drinks were served ,we had the next round which had a colour in the answer. The final round was canal facts.

Of course there was some light-hearted dispute over answers. One question What is the newest canal ? had been taken from the Canal & River Trust website showing Fascinating Facts ; regrettably this had not been checked and was completely wrong !!! The end result was very close with only 9 points separating the top (with 65% score) and the bottom (50%) teams. The losers were presented with chocolate coins whilst the winning team could pick from chocolates or mini wine bottles.

Next day I emailed CRT on a Friday at 17:30 regarding this error and within 30 minutes I had a reply saying their web page was incorrect !!!

Marvellous service; but unfortunately 7 weeks later they have still not changed their website - but by the time you read this .

Peter Webb

Ouse News Page 10

Advertising in Ouse News  Do you want to contact boating enthusiasts?  Advertisements cost £30 (+VAT) per half page or £60 (+VAT) for a whole page for a year.

 Three editions a year.  Circulation = 300 within 30 miles of Cambridge.

 Contact the Editor on 01366 727236 or (carole.alderton@waterways.org.uk)

Ouse News Page 11 Rescue Practice The following photographs were sent to me by one of our readers who thought they would be of interest. Consequently, I followed the item up and obtained a statement from Ely Fire Station:

Ouse News Page 12

We often train at this venue as it has numerous advantages. It s Waterside in Ely where lots of people visit during the summer months. Therefore, if a water related incident should occur, it s highly likely it would be in this area; so obviously it makes sense to train at this location. It also gives a sense of realism as, although we are training, there is still a large volume of moving rivercraft using the waterway; so we still have to implement safe systems of work and need to take account of all the generic risks associated with this type of incident.

We also take time to engage with members of the public answering all sorts of fire safety questions. We invariably show children around the fire engine. This all helps to get our water safety and fire safety messages across.

It s a real win win way of training and engaging with the people we serve.

Watch Commander Jim Sharp

Ouse News Page 13 Cambridgeshire Water Safety Partnership The Cambridgeshire Fire & Rescue Service (CFRS) has instigated the formation of a Water Safety Partnership along the lines of the long standing local Road Safety Partnership. The objective is to drive down the number of water related deaths and injuries and to raise awareness of dangers near and in water. It is intended that the partnership will include such organisations as fire, police and ambulance services plus the Environment Agency, local councils, RNLI, IWA, Anglia Water etc. CFRS will prime the Partnership with £3,000 of funding and also resource delivery, procurement, performance data and administration services. They will be seeking a further £7,000 from the Police & Crime Commissioner in order to bring the total water safety budget for year one up to £10,000.

In 2014, following a number of water related fatalities, Cambridge Constabulary, in conjunction with CFRS, launched Op Harvell ; water location markers that identified high risk sites with difficult access were identified and given a location code. A risk card was created to assist emergency responders with a joined-up approach to an incident, outlining best access and potential launch sites for rescue vessels.

The CFRS also created a Remember Ronny presentation (in memory of a young boy who drowned in Huntingdon in 2014). This has been delivered to Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 3 children across the County, raising awareness of the dangers of open water and the presence of newly installed location markers.

Cambridgeshire encompasses numerous waterways such as the River Cam, River Great Ouse and the River Nene that contain fixed water hazards such as locks and weirs.

Ouse News Page 14 There are also open bodies of water located in drains, country parks, disused pits and flood plains. There have been 17 water related deaths, 30 injuries and 46 incidents requiring rescue in the County over the past 5years.

The organisers have looked at best practice in other counties and found that many have adopted the practice of installing rescue station notice boards at strategic hazardous locations. The boards are generally painted red and show location details, emergency telephone numbers and rescue advice (see illustrated example). Locked boxes containing emergency throwlines are fixed to the boards. In order to gain access, members of the public are instructed to telephone the number shown on the board and state the location code. The operator will then provide the lock combination number. This type of installation has been found to be more effective and resistant to vandalism than the more common life ring set up. Providing accurate location details of an incident to rescue services can be a major problem, as many water hazards are found in remote areas well away from roads or habitation.

It has been suggested that the international ‘what3words’ system be adopted as this can provide a location accurate to within three metres by just entering three words. Details of the system can be found at what3words.com.

Alternatively, a unique reference number known to the emergency services can be shown on the rescue throwline station.

Ouse News Page 15 It is intended that in the first year of operation the partnership will replace the six ‘Op Havell’ water location markers already in use with new throwline stations. The Cambridgeshire Constabulary would install the boards and Cambridgeshire Fire & Rescue Service would maintain them. It is hoped that funding will become available to roll out the scheme to other locations in subsequent years. The Great Ouse Branch committee fully support this initiative and intend to be active participants in developing the Partnership.

Keith Alderton Environment Agency - Anglian Waterways Volunteer Scheme The EA volunteer scheme really developed momentum last year, thanks to the co-ordination, management and support by CambsAcre. We are now looking to recruit new volunteers for the 2019 season.

Sixteen volunteer lock keepers were trained in 2018. This included classroom training on health and safety, operational procedures and how to deal with difficult customers! I am pleased to say that the latter has been unnecessary.

Following this, we had practical training at various lock sites, led by the River Inspector Team. This ensured that those with no, or little, boating experience could quickly become confident and benefit from others with more experience.

My volunteering days have been spent mainly at either St Ives or Houghton locks. We work in pairs and tend to be available from Friday through to Monday. The Houghton and St Ives team consists of only 4 active volunteers, this means that coverage is not as extensive as we would like. Despite this we have helped 283 boats to lock though on our patch.

Ouse News Page 16 Other volunteers operate during the season at the Denver Complex and Northampton Marina.

In addition to lock keeping we have been involved in ground clearance at Northampton lock island, helped to staff the EA stands at Bedford and St Neots River Festivals. We proved useful by providing help and advice about licensing, facilities, boat ownership and assisting passages through St Neots lock before and after the festival.

We will be back in action at the locks in April 2019 and during the winter will be helping with several practical projects and joint training with EA staff.

This has been a thoroughly enjoyable experience, working outdoors, helping other people, (including the very needy stag and hen party day boats) and last but not least being thanked by the skippers and crew on every boat passing through our locks truly wonderful!

If you would like to join our fantastic volunteer group, working mainly on the Great Ouse, please contact: Rachael Brown, Cambridgeshire ACRE on 01353 865037 Roger Green

Ouse News Page 17 Carry on Camping!

The IWA s Waterway Recovery Group (WRG) has released it s programme of weeklong residential working holidays for 2019. This year WRG are running 23 Canal Camps across 13 different waterways that all need the support of up to 20 volunteers each week. In 2018, over 390 volunteers joined WRG up and down the country to undertake 2262 volunteer days (18096 hours) restoring canals. If time had a value, that s over £260,000 of labour costs! But of course the time and effort of all IWA and WRG volunteers is priceless.

The aim of the Canal Camp programme is to support the admirable work of local canal restoration societies. Across all the Canal Camps in the UK, volunteers will have the chance to learn new skills, meet new people and get stuck into tasks such as restoring locks, re-lining canals, creating towpaths, removing vegetation and uncovering archaeological artefacts.

Leading the way!

Volunteers are the life blood that keeps WRG alive and each year over 90 volunteer leaders, assistants and cooks are needed. The leadership teams bring invaluable experience, passing down their knowledge and skills to the next generation of Canal Restoration volunteers. WRG s leadership teams are responsible for making sure each canal camp is a fun-filled, enjoyable experience they run the canal restoration site, organising social activities in the evenings, and ensure that everyone is still smiling by the end of the week! With support from IWA s Technical Support Officer, Mikk Bradley, the leadership teams ensure each week is well-planned, working closely with the host canal restoration society.

Mike Palmer, Chair of the Waterway Recovery Group, says, We are looking for volunteers from all walks of life to help us with our canal restoration projects. In return for helping to preserve our industrial heritage and restoring our beloved canals, we can offer volunteers a fantastic chance to learn new skills such as bricklaying, restoring a flight of locks, building a new section of canal, or even rebuilding a bridge. It s also a great opportunity to have fun and mix with different people who all share a common goal to bring our waterways back to life.

Ouse News Page 18 Family Canal Camps 2019 (contÂ’d from page 17) The IWA recognises families would like to get involved with canal restoration and aims to provide an opportunity to introduce children to restoration work. By offering family volunteering the charity hopes to engage children from a young age and enable them to find out about canal restoration and heritage, working outdoors and learn new skills. The aim of family residential weekends is to introduce a new generation to the world of waterway restoration and maintenance. After three successful weekends and fantastic feedback in 2018, WRG has extended the programme for 2019 to cover three residential weekends for families.

If you would like to book up a Camp in your area or further afield, please visit WRGÂ’s website www.wrg.org.uk. Alternatively, you can call WRG head office on 01494 783453 ext 610, or email enquiries@wrg.org.uk.

Ouse News Page 19

The Great River Race When we were both working full-time we used to extend our cruising range by staging the boat and cars around the country either side of our main holiday. On this occasion we had left the boat in the backwater behind Shepperton Lock, on the River Thames, for a few weeks prior to returning back to base.

The return journey began with us meeting my cousin and partner at Stanstead Abbotts, on the River Lee, after work on the Friday and then driving to Shepperton, arriving just before midnight ready for an early start on Saturday. I had already contacted the lock keeper at Limehouse and knew that we would have to scoot down to Teddington in order to catch high water on the Thames tideway. He informed us that the Great River Race would be taking place, but that as long as the race marshals at Richmond were happy it would be okay for us to proceed.

Ouse News Page 20 He advised that we should telephone him as we approached Tower Bridge so that he could pick us up on CCTV and have the lock open ready.

Having never before heard of the Great River Race, we had no idea what to expect apart from the fact that it involved some rowing boats. As we were to find out to our cost, it actually involved some 300 rowing boats!

There were semi-professional college crews with the appropriate kit and others dressed in all manner of fancy dress. There were nurses, Vikings, clowns, fairies, teddy bears and others dressed in every imaginable fancy kit that you could possibly think of. The competitors were handicapped according to skill and experience, with starting times staggered so that they arrived in the Pool of London enmasse.

To start with, the going was easy with only boats with the least able crews to contend with. However, as we progressed further downstream, more and more boats began to pass us, with the most professional crews shooting past on both sides with all the normal rules of navigation being ignored.

Soon it was wall-to-wall rowing boats as far as the eye could see. Matters were made much worse by the fact that competing teams were allowed a spare crew member and would therefore periodically stop rowing and swap places, oblivious to the fact that they had 17 tonnes of steel riding the tide behind them.

An additional hazard that gave us a nasty fright was a poorly anchored lighter with a deafeningly loud sound system on board, the stern of which was swinging wildly from side to side. As we were hemmed in by rowing boats we could not give it a wide berth. Luckily, we were able to time a short burst of speed to get us past between swings.

We duly made several attempts to contact the lock keeper at Limehouse as instructed, but nobody answered the phone.

Due to the volume of river traffic, I had planned to turn just downstream of Limehouse Lock and come upstream against the tide so as to make the passage into the lock entrance a more controllable manoeuvre.

Ouse News Page 21 However, this was not possible as a tug towing a double string of waste lighters was approaching upstream, hugging the north bank. There was, therefore, no option but to go for plan B. This involved clenching my buttocks tightly shut, cutting across the solid stream of rowing boats and going flat out for the embankment wall several hundred yards upstream of the lock, letting the strong current carry me sideways swiftly down to the entrance cut.

It was at this point that the EA s director s launch Windrush ignored my I am going to turn left sound signal and cut me up on the port side. Thankfully, we managed to avoid all such hazards and slid into the lock entrance cut in a seemingly masterly fashion only to find the gate closed and no sign of the lock keeper.

Thank God there was a floating pontoon to tie up against, but physically holding the boat against the pontoon in a four foot swell proved somewhat challenging. Carole was duly despatched up the slippery fifteen foot vertical steel ladder to look for signs of life. The harbour master s office was found to be locked and there was nobody on duty, despite us confirming our passage the previous day.

It was now well on into the afternoon and we did not fancy spending the night on the tideway bouncing about against the pontoon. Luckily, Carole came across a local resident boater who said that she may find the lock keeper in the Cruising Association bar. When Carole did eventually find her, she stated that she had been told that as the Great River Race was on there would be nobody wanting to use the lock and that she could, therefore, go home early.

Thankfully, all s well that ends well and we finally docked safely in the basin none the worse for the experience. However the captain deemed that a clean pair of trousers and a couple of large glasses of scotch would be in order.

Ouse News Page 22 Our travelling companions were first time boaters and we hoped that they did not think that boating was always such a hair-raising experience! However, they must have enjoyed it as they have since joined us on several further occasions. The trip back to Stanstead Abbotts proved to be uneventful apart from my cousinÂ’s partner trying to grab hold of a wildly flailing windlass and very nearly breaking his arm. All that remained was for us to drive back to Shepperton to retrieve a car and then return to Norfolk.

We have made the trip down the Thames tideway to Limehouse successfully on a number of occasions and although it is always exhilarating, it is not usually quite such a nail biting ride. So, if you have not done it before, do not be put off. Just make sure that you avoid the Great River Race!

Keith Alderton

Ouse News Page 23

.

Ouse News Page 24

IWA Great Ouse Branch Spring Visit - Jordans Mill, Biggleswade on the banks of the River Ivel Join us on Saturday March 23rd for a guided tour of this historic Victorian mill and see the ingenious milling machinery.

This is the fascinating story about the people and the events behind what was the last working flour mill in Bedfordshire; a story of innovation and survival. The tour of the mill will start at 2.30 pm and will be followed by a cream tea served in the Ouse Room. Members of the committee will be arriving at 1.00 pm for a light lunch (not included in the price of the visit) prior to the tour, and branch members are welcome to join us. Please let us know if this is your intention.

More details about Jordans Mill, Langford Rd., Biggleswade, SG18 9JY, including how to get there, can be found on their website https:// jordansmill.com/ The cost of the tour and afternoon tea is £13.95 per person inclusive.

Please complete the form below and send it, with a cheque, made out to IWA Great Ouse Branch to: Keith Alderton, 57 Globe Street, Methwold, Thetford, IP26 4PQ by Monday March 18th. If you have any questions or need any more information please contact Keith on 01366 727236.  ---------------------------------------------------------------------Please reserve .. places on the Jordans Mill visit on March 23rd I enclose a cheque for £ ...........................

Name ......................................................

Tel No ..................................................... e-mail .....................................................

Date .......................................................

Ouse News Page 25

Bridge Boatyard Bridge Road Ely, Cambs CB7 4DY

email info@bridgeboatyard.com Website www.bridgeboatyard.com Telephone 01353 663726

Moorings in marina and on riverside in historic Ely. Close to rail station.

Repairs and servicing Engineering and glassfibre workshops Slipway Suppliers of diesel, gas and coal Authorised Nanni dealership Gas safe engineer

Ouse News Page 26 River News from the Environment Agency Waterways Operations Team Leader (Gt. Ouse and Stour Navigations) Paul Separovic Winter Works Schedule as at Friday, 8th February 2019

Ouse News Page 27 Pump-Out Token Progress For those that use Environment Agency Pump-Out Facilities, you will likely be aware of our plans to introduce a token operation system. We intend to have this in place for the new boating season. We are still finalising and setting up new Navigation Agents to obtain tokens from and are clearing up the last few issues to enable the token system to launch.

One of the measures that will be in place will be new information panels at each pump-out location detailing the nearest places to obtain tokens and what status the pump-out is in. Whilst some Navigation Agents are still to be confirmed and yet to receive stock to become fully up and running not all Agents will offer all services. The current list, including those pending, as it stands at the time of press are; 1. Bridge Boatyard 2. Buckden Marina 3. Bedford Milton Keynes Trust 4. Cathedral Marina Ely 5. Denver Lock Denver Complex 6. Ely Boat Chandlers 7. Ely Tourist Information Centre 8. Fish and Duck Marina, Popes Corner Cam/Old West River/Ely Ouse 9. Hermitage Lock, Earith 10.Jones Boatyard, St Ives 11.Little Ouse Moorings 12.Westview Marina

The above selection of Navigation Agents are geographically spread across the river and offer a 7 day a week service at a number of the locations, especially where pump-outs are located, so you should be able to purchase a token when and where required. We are constantly on the lookout for new agents; so if you know of one please get in touch.

Pump-out tokens costs are currently £10 a token and can be used across both the River Great Ouse and Nene navigations and 1 token should allow sufficient time to empty the most common sizes of holding tanks. Should anyone experience any difficulties in using an Environment Agency pumpout facility, they will need to contact the Environment Agency in relation to the issue, as our Navigation Agents will be unable to assist.

Ouse News Page 28

The Inland Waterways Association is a non-profit distributing company limited by guarantee.

Registered in England No 612245.

Registered as a charity No 212342. Registered Office: Island House, Moor Rd, Chesham, HP5 1WA. Phone No 01494 783453.