End of garden agreement

[jpmcq]

Hi

 

I am in the process of buying a house that backs onto the Leeds/Liverpool canal (Maghull area of Liverpool) and I am looking for info regarding the strip of land that the CART owns between the garden & the canal (I have checked the land registry & the garden boundary ends about 1m from the canal).

 

I have read a lot of information regarding having to pay a mooring fee if I want to have a boat at the end of the garden, this seems clear, apart from the fact that I'm not sure if I would receive the 50% discount as I don't own the land up to the canal?

 

However, I have also been given the impression (by the solicitor & current home owner) that I may be expected to pay a 'tenancy fee' (or end of garden agreement fee) to incorporate this strip of land into my garden, regardless of whether or not I have a boat.  The current home owner has said that they stopped paying this fee around 8 years ago & there is very little mention of it on the internet (I have only managed to find one thread about it on this forum & that was from 2007 I think), so it makes me wonder if this is something that people are not aware of or paying?

[zenataomm]

You need to apply for The End of Garden Mooring.

It's not automatic, C&RT may decide they don't want a boat moored at that spot because ...

* There may be a bridge or blind corner near.

* There are already too many on line moorings already in that pound.

* It may be too shallow for you to get your boat right up to the bank leaving it stuck out.

* They may have already agreed to support and/or invest in a marina nearby in exchange for reducing the already number of on line moorings.

* Any other number of weaselly excuses that may confuse and confound decent sensible people.

 

Having achieved permission you will then pay a yearly fee equivalent to about 50% of the market value for a mooring in your area.

As for not having access to the narrow strip where your garden meets the water unless you pay anyway, I understand that would be covered in your mooring agreement .

Still, unless you had a boat there, why would you want to tread on it?

And how would they know if you did?

Have they sensors in the ground that will ring loud bells in Milton Flaming Keynes? 

[matty40s]

if you are wanting to have a boat there, you will have to pay - its a percentage of local mooring costs - either online or marina fees. 

If you owned the land right up to the water (which you dont according to the land registry documents you have seen as part of the sale) CRt would struggle to enforce any fee on you. 

If the house is not new, look back through historical maps and records to see if it previously was a wharf or similar, sometimes BW/CRT assumed ownership rights when they didnt have them.

The bottom of your garden is yours, you do not have to pay a fee to have a canal at the bottom of your garden.

CRT could insist you remove the planters, LED strings, and garden chairs on their metre of land, but will not. If they do, just cite Wellbeing....

They are responsible to fix the piling/concrete/bank on your stretch - if you so something like build a decking platform to the edge, make sure it is either removable, or supported from 1m back from the edge so they can work on it without having to remove your structures.

 

 

* They may have already agreed to support and/or invest in a marina nearby in exchange for reducing the already number of on line moorings

 

This restriction was removed last year - so if someone cites it, it is not correct anymore.

Edited June 17, 2019 by matty40s

[TheBiscuits]

7 minutes ago, matty40s said:

if you are wanting to have a boat there, you will have to pay - its a percentage of local mooring costs - either online or marina fees. 

There is always a localish reference site.  CRT will tell you which one it is if you ask nicely.  Standard rates are 50% of that.

 

9 minutes ago, matty40s said:

If you owned the land right up to the water (which you dont according to the land registry documents you have seen as part of the sale) CRt would struggle to enforce any fee on you. 

Unless you want to moor a boat there, when you have to pay the End of Garden fees.

11 minutes ago, matty40s said:

If the house is not new, look back through historical maps and records to see if it previously was a wharf or similar, sometimes BW/CRT assumed ownership rights when they didnt have them.

The bottom of your garden is yours, you do not have to pay a fee to have a canal at the bottom of your garden.

True and true.

11 minutes ago, matty40s said:

They are responsible to fix the piling/concrete/bank on your stretch

Not always true, but in your case yes, because they kept the ransom strip.

[cuthound]

I have an end of garden mooring on the Coventry Canal. I had to develop it when i bought the house as there were conifers growing between the house and the cut.

 

As others have said, the owner of the land will have to pay CRT to apply for an end of garden mooring. I managed to get the local moorings manager to accept an application from me, supported by a letter from the then house owner, because I didn't want to buy the house then find CRT wouldn't allow a mooring. The whole process took 16 weeks, although they said 6 ?.

 

CRT have permission to access to the last meter of my garden but I only pay an annual fee for the actual mooring. This annual mooring fee is 50% of the nearest CRT mooring without facilities. It happens to be about 20% of the cost of putting my boat into the nearest commercial marina.

 

 

[Athy]

9 minutes ago, cuthound said:

 

 

CRT have permission to access to the last meter of my garden but I only pay an annual fee for the actual mooring. 

 

 

You raise an interesting point which I haven't seen discussed in the various previous threads about EOG moorings.

Say your garden canal frontage is 70' but your boat is only 35' long. On which measurement do you pay your mooring fee?

[jetzi]

This raises another interesting question for me. Hypothetically if you owned a field/large garden next to a canal/river (especially if it doesn't have a CaRT-owned ransom strip), and you were to dig an offshoot into your property, shore up the edges and flood it with canal water, this would be entirely yours, right? So you surely would not need to pay any mooring fees for a boat kept there - nor even, provided you don't ever navigate, a license?

[mrsmelly]

4 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

This raises another interesting question for me. Hypothetically if you owned a field/large garden next to a canal/river (especially if it doesn't have a CaRT-owned ransom strip), and you were to dig an offshoot into your property, shore up the edges and flood it with canal water, this would be entirely yours, right? So you surely would not need to pay any mooring fees for a boat kept there - nor even, provided you don't ever navigate, a license?

Not everybody has to pay end of garden mooring fees anyway, it is different in many locations. The only thing ever to do when these situations crop up is see a solicitor, pay a few shillings and do it right. A canal forum is most certainly not the place for unambiguous correct information.

[Athy]

12 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

This raises another interesting question for me. Hypothetically if you owned a field/large garden next to a canal/river (especially if it doesn't have a CaRT-owned ransom strip), and you were to dig an offshoot into your property, shore up the edges and flood it with canal water, this would be entirely yours, right? So you surely would not need to pay any mooring fees for a boat kept there - nor even, provided you don't ever navigate, a license?

It's been done: just above Cropredy lock, one of the houses on Creampot Close had such an offshoot, cut at right angles to the canal, and they kept a 30'-ish narrowboat in it. I don't know if they had to pay BW (as it was then) for it. BW would doubtless have pointed out that it was their water.

[mayalld]

13 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

This raises another interesting question for me. Hypothetically if you owned a field/large garden next to a canal/river (especially if it doesn't have a CaRT-owned ransom strip), and you were to dig an offshoot into your property, shore up the edges and flood it with canal water, this would be entirely yours, right? So you surely would not need to pay any mooring fees for a boat kept there - nor even, provided you don't ever navigate, a license?

Indeed so.

 

Of course, the prosecution for criminal damage to the banks of their canal would be somewhat irksome, and the fact that they came along the next week and sealed your new arm off from the canal.

 

It has been done before.

 

[dor]

15 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

This raises another interesting question for me. Hypothetically if you owned a field/large garden next to a canal/river (especially if it doesn't have a CaRT-owned ransom strip), and you were to dig an offshoot into your property, shore up the edges and flood it with canal water, this would be entirely yours, right? So you surely would not need to pay any mooring fees for a boat kept there - nor even, provided you don't ever navigate, a license?

A previous tenant of the Shady Oak (Shroppie) tried this.  CRT came down very hard on him when they found out.  You can't just cut into the side of the canal, whether you own the land right up to the edge or not.

(The tenant did a runner, and the owners had to pay to refill the hole and reinstate the edge of the canal to CRT's approval.)

[Arthur Marshall]

28 minutes ago, dor said:

A previous tenant of the Shady Oak (Shroppie) tried this.  CRT came down very hard on him when they found out.  You can't just cut into the side of the canal, whether you own the land right up to the edge or not.

(The tenant did a runner, and the owners had to pay to refill the hole and reinstate the edge of the canal to CRT's approval.)

Much to the annoyance of a mate of mine, who was going to moor there.

 

[jpmcq]

Thanks for the replies all, although I would like a mooring at some point in the future, it is not a priority at the moment & I would still like to purchase the house regardless. 

 

My main concern is that I am paying what I see as a premium (in the purchase price) to have the canal at the end of the garden, and I would like to make use of the land immediately adjacent to the canal (garden furniture, perhaps some decking etc).  Therefore I would not want CART coming along & fencing off that portion of land, if I refused to pay them an amount of money of their choosing.

[MtB]

10 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Not always true, but in your case yes, because they kept the ransom strip.

 

Which raises another point I've not seen discussed on here. 

 

BW/CRT are prone to allowing erosion of the offside bank. Once their ransom strip is under water and the canal is encroaching into YOUR land, some photographs to prove where the boundary lies might be useful or CRT might just claim the 1m ransom strip moves back with the water's edge.....

 

 

 

[jetzi]

39 minutes ago, mayalld said:

Of course, the prosecution for criminal damage to the banks of their canal would be somewhat irksome, and the fact that they came along the next week and sealed your new arm off from the canal. 

Would it be possible to do this legally? Get planning permission and an agreement from CaRT to cut into the bank? Would it be possible to avoid having to pay mooring fees if they agreed to allowing you to cut into the canal or do you think they would still demand such?

What if you found a location that was on an ex-navigable canal (no longer CaRT) or little-used canal, or a river without engineered banks, or a non-CaRT waterway?

I suppose an alternative would be to install a crane or (retractable) slipway and trolley to lift your boat from the canal to your garden and back, avoiding the need to cut into the bank. Probably not even that much more expensive than creating your own basin, at least if you try to create it the legal way.

 

Seems a shame if you couldn't cut into the bank under any circumstances, it would be really nice to have a mooring on your own property outside of CaRT's jurisdiction.

[Alan de Enfield]

2 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

Would it be possible to do this legally? Get planning permission and an agreement from CaRT to cut into the bank?

Yes - its called the NAA (National Access Agreement)

You jump thru hoops and then pay 'a kidney' to 'park in your own garden'

[Athy]

11 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

I suppose an alternative would be to install a crane or (retractable) slipway and trolley to lift your boat from the canal to your garden and back, avoiding the need to cut into the bank. Probably not even that much more expensive than creating your own basin, at least if you try to create it the legal way.

 

 

This, too, has been done:there is currently a narrowboat nestling in a hollow in a field by the Oxford Canal. I don't know whether it was lifted in or whether the owner broke the canal bank to get it there.

[jetzi]

10 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Yes - its called the NAA (National Access Agreement)

You jump thru hoops and then pay 'a kidney' to 'park in your own garden'

 

1 minute ago, Athy said:

This, too, has been done:there is currently a narrowboat nestling in a hollow in a field by the Oxford Canal. I don't know whether it was lifted in or whether the owner broke the canal bank to get it there.

How about a secret lock gate, disguised to look exactly like the canal bank when closed, leading into a covered wet dock boat garage that you could park in? Or would they come around knocking looking for hollow spots?

[Alan de Enfield]

2 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

 

How about a secret lock gate, disguised to look exactly like the canal bank when closed, leading into a covered wet dock boat garage that you could park in? Or would they come around knocking looking for hollow spots?

Thunderbirds are "GO"

 

 

[NigelMoore]

1 hour ago, mayalld said:

 

Of course, the prosecution for criminal damage to the banks of their canal would be somewhat irksome, and the fact that they came along the next week and sealed your new arm off from the canal.

 

It has been done before.

 

Done most notoriously in the 1998 Yardley Gobion marina case.

 

What is of significance in that case to the current topic is the argument for BW that actually accepted the right of riparian owners to cut away the banks to form a lay-by; it was the extension of that right to create a marina that was (successfully) argued against.

 

Sadly, though understandably, BW & CaRT have resolutely declined to publish the judgment.

 

 

[jetzi]

4 minutes ago, NigelMoore said:

Done most notoriously in the 1998 Yardley Gobion marina case.

 

What is of significance in that case to the current topic is the argument for BW that actually accepted the right of riparian owners to cut away the banks to form a lay-by; it was the extension of that right to create a marina that was (successfully) argued against.

 

Sadly, though understandably, BW & CaRT have resolutely declined to publish the judgment.

Wow, does this apply only to the Grand Junction Canal or all canals?

[mayalld]

1 hour ago, ivan&alice said:

Would it be possible to do this legally? Get planning permission and an agreement from CaRT to cut into the bank? Would it be possible to avoid having to pay mooring fees if they agreed to allowing you to cut into the canal or do you think they would still demand such?

What if you found a location that was on an ex-navigable canal (no longer CaRT) or little-used canal, or a river without engineered banks, or a non-CaRT waterway?

I suppose an alternative would be to install a crane or (retractable) slipway and trolley to lift your boat from the canal to your garden and back, avoiding the need to cut into the bank. Probably not even that much more expensive than creating your own basin, at least if you try to create it the legal way.

 

Seems a shame if you couldn't cut into the bank under any circumstances, it would be really nice to have a mooring on your own property outside of CaRT's jurisdiction.

Of course you can get agreement to cut through the bank. Marinas do it all the time, and pay an annual fee to CRT.

 

Whilst they don't have jurisdiction outside their waters, the Network Access Agreement will specify that boats must be licenced.

 

Little-used canals are still CRT canals

unnavigable canals are often still CRT canals

Rivers are subject to riparian rights, so no fee to CRT.

non-CRT canals are subject to different rules.

 

Lifting Operations over CRT waterways have to be with their consent.

[NigelMoore]

8 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

Wow, does this apply only to the Grand Junction Canal or all canals?

The same clause was inserted into most enabling Acts, though I cannot say of my own knowledge that ALL of them did. Granting such rights, amongst others, to land owners through whose property canals were to be cut, was designed to encourage support (or at least remove objections) for otherwise unpopular compulsory purchase powers to run cargo-carrying enterprises through private property.

 

Promotional publicity for such Acts often also actively promoted the "wellbeing" aspect of private pleasure boating!

 

In promoting the 1990 Bill that became the 1995 Act, BW sought initially to have all such rights abolished under the proposed clause 27, but they were forced to withdraw it in the face of fierce objections. As a result they attempted instead thereafter, to circumscribe the extent of such rights by argument in each case. They succeeded in Yardley Gobion, respecting how far into one's own land the water could be extended, but failed in Swan Hill Developments respecting whether the right to build bridges over the canal applied to 'single' or only 'double' riparian owners, and whether the rights only attached to original landowners rather than successors in title.

[cuthound]

3 hours ago, Athy said:

You raise an interesting point which I haven't seen discussed in the various previous threads about EOG moorings.

Say your garden canal frontage is 70' but your boat is only 35' long. On which measurement do you pay your mooring fee?

 

35 foot, the length of the boat you moor there.

 

Unfortuneately you are not allowed to sublet any excess canalside frontage.

[Alan de Enfield]

BW / C&RT philosophy on EoG Moorings

 

 

eogmooring.pdf