AMBITIOUS plans to enable more leisure and sporting activities on the River Tees as part of a masterplan for the river corridor are in the early stages of being drawn up.

The move could eventually see enterprise zones along the river, making it easier for new businesses such as cafes and bars as well as leisure companies to start up. It is also hoped that the plans could open up the river to more leisure craft and sports use, including open-water swimming areas and pleasure boats.

Rachel Dodd, director of Rivershack, one of only two companies which currently operates boats on the Tees upstream of the barrage, is pulling together with other stakeholders on the river to look at a co-ordinated strategy to boost its economic potential.

Rivershack has rowing boats on the Tees at Preston Park and also a leisure boat, Juno, which ferries passengers on trips between the park and Yarm. She said: “I think we need to recognise the economic potential of the river Tees with some kind of river initiative.

“We have this asset that is great but it is very underused.

"Here we could have cafes, bars, floating pontoons, and designated swimming areas as well as more boat mooring facilities.

"We could have moor passenger craft. At the moment it is just us and the Teesside Princess. But even if we put more boats on there is no guarantee that people would come because we do need more of a leisure offer.

"There is no power or lighting by the river in some of the main places and we need better access, parking and so on. We need a collective to look at putting in some of the infrastructure and possibly some enterprise zones, bureaucracy-free zones, with broadband and parking.

"We have also got one of the best stretches of river for rowers in the country. There are some people come up from London to train here out of season. There is far less river traffic, and a watersports centre for them, but we could make more of this.

"We could have a marina and boat clubs there too."

Dealing with the different organisations involved with the river, who all have different priorities, including the Environment Agency, Crown Estate and the Canal Rivers Trust, could also be time-consuming and enterprise zones could remove the work from this, she said.

That in turn could encourage more new start-up businesses.