thunderbird

Perhaps I should make CRT's day by standing! Though on second thoughts if I were to stand it would have to be with an organisation that didn't insist in removing paying boaters licences and at the same time insist on spending thousands of pounds of other peoples money keeping the legal profession so well fed! Best then I think not!

CRT's logging of boats overstaying have been known to be inaccurate, often shockingly so. The trust has been known to take the word of boater hating householders over the word of boaters, Loughborough being an example of this. Ralph Freeman was accused of overstaying when he had in fact cruised some considerable distance - shocking inaccuracy again. Tony Ball asked CRT to tell him the location it was holding for him, it said the Erewash, he was more than forty miles away, I know this to be true because I was moored with him. CRT came in with a big stick and continues to wield this - which is why there are increasingly more spaces in marinas, and more boats on the sales jetties. Wrecking the 'dream' has not been a good move on the part of the trust- boating is heading for the doldrums. Parry obviously has no time for we boaters, once a railway man always a railway man and look what the railways did to the canals in the past. RIP the 'dream' and hopefully soonest RIP the arrogant criminally unprofessional trust that only seeks to stop the complaints of those marina owners that feel they were duped by it and by so doing is bringing our waterways to their knees!

It could be that boaters don't worry about what is written in law or they'd stand up to CRT, I find an attitiude of it doesn't affect me so why should I worry - until that is it does affect them - and then they cry!

if the owners of the house have cut off the water then they won't be the first, or prob the last (if any lock cottages are actually left) to do so. CRT expertise at work - it seems they forgot that in several cases the facilities were attached to the cottages - and that those buying the cottages would not wish to finance, boaters needs!

What else did you expect of a railwayman? Boots erstwhile 'Blythe the scythe' has nothing on him!

Having outsourced all of the work thinking up stupid ideas is all they have left!

It should be possible to obtain advice from the lock keepers on how to time and achieve a slack water (around the time of local HW) entry into the Selby Canal from the Ouse following passage downriver from Naburn, but this may fall outside the scope of the usual minimal and simplistic -'one standard procedure and timing will do for all occasions'- advice it seems that CaRT management have instructed their staff to pass on to those unfamiliar with boating in the tides of both the Ouse and the Trent. In the event of your being unable to get the advice and information you want from CaRT, it is available from other sources but must, and can only, be given immediately prior to passage in order to take into account all the variables that affect it, such as predicted tide heights, weather conditions and the quantity of "fresh" (rainwater) in the river at the time.  It should be possible to obtain advice from the lock keepers on how to time and achieve a slack water (around the time of local HW) entry into the Selby Canal from the Ouse following passage downriver from Naburn, but this may fall outside the scope of the usual minimal and simplistic -'one standard procedure and timing will do for all occasions'- advice it seems that CaRT management have instructed their staff to pass on to those unfamiliar with boating in the tides of both the Ouse and the Trent. In the event of your being unable to get the advice and information you want from CaRT, it is available from other sources but must, and can only, be given immediately prior to passage in order to take into account all the variables that affect it, such as predicted tide heights, weather conditions and the quantity of "fresh" (rainwater) in the river at the time.

The water level in the Selby Canal is limited by the level of the River Aire at Haddlesey Flood Lock. The only way to arranger for the canal river level to be raised is to pray for Divine intervention in the form of enough rain to raise the level of the Aire between Haddlesey weir and Beal. If there is a prolonged dry spell prior to your trip to York and Ripon you do have the alternative of avoiding the Selby Canal and the Aire, which can be quite shallow just below Beal Lock, by getting onto the Ouse at Goole, and returning the same way. Entering Ocean lock at Goole on the ebb is problem free, other than the desirability of being no later than an hour and a half after predicted Goole HW (Free Tide Time) outside of which a charge of £31 per penning is payable to ABP. If you do use the Selby Canal route on your return journey and wish to avoid entering Selby lock with the ebb running down past the lock entrance, then you will need to time your arrival and entry to be at, or a little before of after HW at Selby,depending upon the height of the tide (Springs, Neaps or something in between) and whether or not there is any 'fresh' in the river on that day.

Do you know of any available stability information based Inclining results for flat bottomed narrow beam canal boats?

No insult intended! I just didn't put it very well! Thank you for the response.

Keep up Martin, it is a matter of note.

With such a strong southerly wind I bet the lockies thought you a little foolish too. I am of course assuming you ignored advice?

For any that question arrogance on the part of the trust I can tell you CRT'S solicitors walked up to Tony Dunkley before he went into the court waving a piece of paper under his nose telling him he must read it. When he refused, having already read up online the solicitor said 'but Mr Dunkley you must read it, this is what we are going to do today, we are going to obtain an injunction to seize your boat! In Tony's case however they picked the wrong man to play games with, Tony went to a very illustrious school and certainly didn't waste the superb education it offered. They who saw him as a 'big bloke wearing a boiler suit and woolly hat and with a fag hanging out of his mouth' (thus as a pushover) were unwise indeed to judge this particular book by its cover! In CRT's eyes, as with Geoff, just another easy target (it thought!)

In its arrogance CRT just never expects a boater to get up and fight back! We know that too often papers served on unsuspecting boaters have failed to contain the information pack issued by the court - the one that tells a boater he/she has the right to defend and that warns unless that defence is received within 14 days they will have no right to speak, resulting in cases being virtually rubber stamped.