"Maidstone" River Festival !

[oldgit]

There will not be an official river festival this year simply due to the disinterest/incompetence or total river blindness of Maidstone council.
However according To the MSBA website,there once again will be a gathering of local boaters in the town centre this Saturday.Last year about 100 boats turned up.
See you there ? OG.

 

[CLB]

I went last year by road, just for a look, and have to say it seemed like a great event. Hope it's another good one.

 

[oldgit]

Lack of interest by the local authorities has been the main cause of the demise.Although the event used to be run by a a small group of local businessmen,the council provided the glue and nous to provide a fair wind to enable things to get sorted.
The problems started when Kent police wanted £15,000 for crowd control followed by the regular organisers,after doing the thing for years,deciding enough was enough and hoping that somebody/anybody would step into the breach to keep it all going.
All down to nobody having the time or the money to organise this type of public event anymore without corporate subsidy.
At its height,over 150 boats could turn up and an estimated 100.000 plus people would be attracted to the town using the shops resturants pubs etc in the process.
Although some folks started to get bit "sniffy" about the sort of people who were attracted to the festival.it provided at least one example of the fact that the river was not merely a place to dump your soft drink bottle or shopping trolley.