by South Wales Outdoor Activity Providers Group (SWOAPG)
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18 December 2024
Open letter challenges Powys County Council (PCC) on their reluctance to re-open the Upper Glas-y-Bont common on the river Wye in Glasbury for paddlesports. The River Wye between Glasbury and Hay has been used by canoeists for over 100 years, by virtue of permission granted for the public launching of canoes by the landowner of Upper Glas-y-Bont Common. Powys County Council has owned this site since 1994. In April 2021 the Council suspended canoe launching at Glas-y-Bont Common while it conducted a Habitat Regulations Assessment (HRA) to evaluate the potential impact of paddlesports on the river environment. This routine process has still not been completed after the passage of more than 3½ years. SWOAPG, with local activity providers, craft hire operators and national representative bodies, has been working with the Council to develop a ‘concordat arrangement’ which would enable paddlesport touring activity to resume at the site, for both individual users and businesses. Broad agreement had been reached early this year, when a group of fishery owners stepped in and demanded restrictions far beyond those requested by both the Council and Natural Resources Wales (NRW, the environmental regulator). The Council seems reluctant to challenge the fisheries group for fear of legal repercussions and has recently announced that the concordat arrangement is ‘on hold’. Paddlesport organisations are now calling on the Council to take a less cautious approach to break the deadlock and resume public access to this important stretch of river that has been the starting point for so many paddlers’ journeys of recreational discovery and development.