On May 8th the Environment Agency organized a trial of electric powered boats on the Stour at Bures.

The electric outboards which were powered by 90Ah batteries were mounted on Dragonfly skiffs and canoes. The skiffs were capable of taking 5 adults and the outboards, which developed a surprising amount of power, were almost completely silent.

It would be difficult to find any reason to object to these craft other than to regret that this is one more way for our overfed citizens to avoid exercise. The disturbance caused by one of these skiffs is likely to be less than if it were being rowed.

At present the byelaws do not allow powered craft to be used on the river other than between Sudbury and Henny. We can expect that the River Stour Trust will mount a campaign to get the byelaws changed. As you can gather from the previous paragraph there is no reason to object to these small electric motors as such. What we do worry about are the insidious changes that further development of the river will bring in its wake and the opportunity that a proposal to amend the byelaws would give to those who want to widen the franchise.