As this is a National Policy , WHERE ELSE IS IT BEING DONE ?

[Supermalc]

It has Nothing to do with Liveaboards and Leisure boaters

 

It has Nothing to do with Online or Marina Moorers

 

We are all Boaters and if we can't learn get on with each other and help each other out

Then the waterways community has no chance !

 

 

Very well said Simon......

 

As I've said in the past, one of the best things I discovered about boating was how sociable and nice the vast majority are. There is always the odd one or two, but in the main, of the boaters that pass on the Witham, most are the former, nomatter what boat they are on.

[Sir Nibble]

I see it as a battle between marina bods and onliners.

 

A little while ago we had an amusing thread about the hierarchy of boaters, and how shiny boat owners in marinas look down on everyone else. The reverse is true, why am I the scapegoat for all ills 'cos I moor in a marina?

I suspect that many marina berth holders are there for the same reason as me. We NEED a mooring, as in must have, it's a licence condition, and moorings are simply not plentiful enough to leave any choice. I have NOT turned down a nice cut-cred loaded online mooring in order to set myself a cut above the proles, I have taken the ONLY mooring that was available to me, and damned lucky to get it.

Can we please stop portraying marina moorers as some kind of evil robber barons.

[magnetman]

Yeah sorry I know and my use of the word battle was wrong. I'll leave this thread now.

Edited October 15, 2007 by magnetman

[Amduck]

I'd like to echo snibble. Am new to this forum, as in the process of buying a boat. Was told by everyone to find a mooring first. This is time critical for me, as I need to be able to stay on the boat asap (but not fully residential). The mooring we were able to find was in a marina - I had no idea this would somehow make me the enemy to some boaters, and I certainly hope that this attitude will not prevail when I'm out there cruising - I hope I'm a pretty friendly person, and will certainly need some help and guidance from those with experience. Some posts on here, and on some of the other threads, make me feel a bit nervous about who might be approachable and who might not.

[Sir Nibble]

Relax mate. I have not encountered any hostility whatever to marina moorers anywhere at all but on this forum. Where is your mooring?

[Amduck]

Relax mate. I have not encountered any hostility whatever to marina moorers anywhere at all but on this forum. Where is your mooring?

 

Tewkesbury. (But not quite got the boat yet)

 

Another point against us, it'll probably be an ex-hire boat (horrors!!!)

[StoneHenge]

Tewkesbury. (But not quite got the boat yet)

 

Another point against us, it'll probably be an ex-hire boat (horrors!!!)

 

You won't get any comments from me mate. Mine is a an ex hire and it's every bit as good as a private boat. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I already had those cracks from people when someone said as we passed 'my boats made of proper steel mine is'. Meant as a dig at us, but actually mine is made of proper steel too. OK, maybe not the exact quality of boats made 50 years ago maybe, but it's still steel, to the same spec etc.

 

If an ex hire boat is looked after, then you won't have any problems. If you moor in a marina, it's fine. My mooring is also a marina moorings. I just chose not to live in it most of the time, but that's me, and a lot of folk I know have to for work etc.

Edited October 15, 2007 by StoneHenge

[carlt]

Relax mate. I have not encountered any hostility whatever to marina moorers anywhere at all but on this forum. Where is your mooring?

I don't recall anyone being hostile towards marina moorers, snibble. can you show the quotes?

[magpie patrick]

At the risk of getting shot down by both sides, especially as I have an EOG mooring courtesy of parental friends who are too old to have their own boat...

 

There are approximatly 25,000 private boats licensed on the system, and this has grown at around 3-8% per year for some time. If they need an average 50 feet of canal bank each they would need 236 miles of canal, or around 10% of the national system: one mile in ten might be OK, but of course boats aren't spread evenly round the system and it would be more like two miles in three on some canals. Val and I enjoy looking at the moored boats on line, but we also want some canal where there are no moored boats. I've never been down the southern oxford, but I have heard people say to allow more time than you might expect because of the amount of time on tickover.

 

But where this policy has gone horribly wrong is around the new pillings marina: for one, why not just put an embargo on further on-line moorings or only allow growth up to a density, perhaps the one mile in ten above, but the policy of knocking off one on line for every ten new off line moorings is intended to ease congestion at hotspots: e.g open a new 250 space marina on (say) the SU and remove 25 on-line, which in this case would probably be within less than five miles. But if opening a new Marina in Loughborough means removing on line moorings in Sawley then it suggests that there isn't any congestion to resolve in the first place. Plus I wouldnt mind betting that the on line moorings at Redhill Marina aren't affected because they are actually on the river and BW can't get rid of them.

 

When Ripple comes down here I will probably have to go for a marina berth: i'd rather not, but there isn't much else avaialble...

[carlt]

A very sensible post, I thought, MP. the South Oxford isn't as bad as people say, IMHO, but I don't have a problem slowing down anyway and I don't time my journeys.

 

25 boats moored online don't add congestion, 250 new marina moorings do though, so the eviction of online moorers would have a negligible effect anyway.

 

I wouldn't necessarily disagree to an embargo on more online moorings but isn't this common practice anyway? I was told 6 years ago that there would be no new long term linear moorings provided, and I can't think of any, off the top of my head.

 

If they really want to reduce the number of linear moorers then natural wastage is the only fair way.

Edited October 15, 2007 by carlt

[magpie patrick]

Soory Carl, for clarity, I meant congestion in terms of too many on-line moorings, whatever too many might be... point being if you need to look fifteen miles away to make up the "one for ten" then on-line mooring really isn't an issue and applying the policy isn't having the desired effect

 

yes, if they must reduce on line moorings (and I'm not sure they need to) natural wastage is the only fair way forward.

[Sir Nibble]

I don't recall anyone being hostile towards marina moorers, snibble. can you show the quotes?

O woe, I really can't be arsed to trawl through the forum for that. In fairness, "Hostility" might be the wrong word, certainly the evil marina based hordes of posh-look-down-their-noses enemies of all boaty freedom are frequently cited, especially when on line moorings or bridge hopping is discussed. So, delete "hostility" and enter "constant drip drip drip of derision and general disrespect." Much of the problem perhaps is that those outside the marina don't see the difference between a boat that is visited occasionally and hosts gin and buns, and the marina based boat that is visited occasionally and got OUT of the DAMN marina ASAP.

[carlt]

O woe, I really can't be arsed to trawl through the forum for that. In fairness, "Hostility" might be the wrong word, certainly the evil marina based hordes of posh-look-down-their-noses enemies of all boaty freedom are frequently cited, especially when on line moorings or bridge hopping is discussed. So, delete "hostility" and enter "constant drip drip drip of derision and general disrespect." Much of the problem perhaps is that those outside the marina don't see the difference between a boat that is visited occasionally and hosts gin and buns, and the marina based boat that is visited occasionally and got OUT of the DAMN marina ASAP.

I think you're probably guilty of the same generalisations that some boaters on linear moorings assume. Not all boaters mooring online judge marina dwellers.

 

Personally, I have more friends whose boats reside in marinas, than online, probably because there are more people in marinas to befriend.

 

Idon't give a hoot if you're in a marina weekending, liveaboard or never seeing your boat. Nor online, trailer sailing, bridge hopping or on the bank being restored. Judging a person on their location is as silly as judging them on the material their boat is made from.

 

I wouldn't want to be in a marina but I'm glad the majority of boaters would.

[LisaG1]

I too don't have a problem with boaters in a marina. I have lots of friends in marinas but me personally i don't want to live in one. I also don't mind what boat you have, whether it be a ex hire, GRP, wood, etc. I love going past moored boats, because every boat is unique in its own way.

 

Lisa

[mikes]

There is an interesting logistical issue that the new 284 berth marina at Saul Junction may create. The access to the marina is on the Stroudwater Canal (online mooring opposite!). Boats must turn left out of the marina (the Stroudwater doesn't go anywhere the other way - yet ). To get onto the Gloucester/Sharpness Canal there is a swing bridge. Most boats are going to want to turn right/North onto the GS where there is immediately another swing bridge. Protocol says that both swing bridges cannot be open at the same time. On the Google satellite picture from the link below, the marina is on the field bottom left and the Stroudwater is to the right of the field.

 

http://www.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en...p;z=17&om=1

 

The guy who operates the bridges is going to be knackered!!

 

That said, we have put our name down for a mooring, if successful we start looking for the boat. Marina due to open March 2008.

 

Mike

[Chris Pink]

Not BW's waterways, our waterways.It's about time BW started behaving like the Civil Service department it is and stopped bullying people into thinking "It's their canal, they're God."

 

British Waterways is a body appointed by a government elected by us to manage our canals for us.

 

As a corollary to this, the way we decide to use our canals, provided it is within the law as stated in the various acts, is entirely up to us. British Waterways have absolutely no right to have an opinion on the way we use the canals.

 

It is unfortunate that it seems necessary to remind them so often of these, to me, simple facts.

 

Rant over.

[onthecut]

Hi All.

 

What a thread ! First and foremost to me, we should all remember that whatever our craft and wherever we moor it, we aren't just users of the system, we are an absolutely integral component of it. In case you've stopped noticing because you're used to it, just watch how often complete strangers will wait to photograph your boat. How they will gather round a lock. How they will wander along a row of moored boats talking about them and peering in. (Which, incidentally I think is mostly genuine interest and curiosity rather than just 'nosiness') In our pc and paranoid world, the canal must be the last place left where a bloke can wave at a young child and the parents will encourage the child to wave back --- why --- because we're on a boat. I've yet to see anyone photographing anglers, joggers, cyclists, dog walkers etc.

I would like to think that at least some of the powers that be within BW understand that and also that there is a limit to how far you can push the boating community before the law of diminishing returns comes into play. Lets be clear -- if there were no requirement to keep the waterways open for navigation (in the practical rather than the statutory sense -- too late for that), there would be a massive round of selling off, followed by the decimation of BW. I guess those working there are reasonably keen to avoid that and so, to an extent, have common cause with us.

In my neck of the woods there are now roadside posters encouraging people to use 'their' canal (cue photo of happy jogger, etc.) A successful campaign to safeguard our use of the canal must include getting across to the powers that be, that without us, the system would simply cease to exist in a recognisable and attractive form. I think someone earlier in the thread used the phrase 'linear theme park' -- without the boats, that's just what it would be. We bring it to life !!!

 

Mike.

[Yoda]

BW was set up to close the waterways. They managed to spend all their money on administration for many years. Volunteers keep the waterways open.

[Grasshopper]

British Waterways is a body appointed by a government elected by us to manage our canals for us.

 

As a corollary to this, the way we decide to use our canals, provided it is within the law as stated in the various acts, is entirely up to us. British Waterways have absolutely no right to have an opinion on the way we use the canals.

 

Doesn't the act of appointing someone to manage something rather presuppose that you expect them to formulate opinions on the matter and act upon them? That's rather the point of management. Or at least it was when I did it.

[Big John]

whatever our craft and wherever we moor it, we aren't just users of the system, we are an absolutely integral component of it.

 

I would like to think that at least some of the powers that be within BW understand that and also that there is a limit to how far you can push the boating community before the law of diminishing returns comes into play

Chief executive Robin Evans and marketing & customer service director Simon Salem,

have set aside four dates for hour-long, face to face discussions with

waterway users on the subject: The dates and locations are:

 

Tuesday 4 Dec in Watford, 2pm, 3pm and 4pm

Thursday 13 Dec in Leeds, 5pm, 6pm or 7pm

Friday 14 Dec in Gloucester, 2pm. 3pm and 4pm

Sunday 16 Dec in Hatton (Warwickshire), 10am, 11am and 12 noon

 

More details at:

http://www.waterscape.com/features-and-art...e-november-2007