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Possible breach near Wharton's Lock, Shropshire Union


rgreg

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38 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Well the policy is not to maintain, wait till it fails.   Obviously the leak was not severe enough to warrant an easy fix so they waited till it was a full blown breach.

 

You could not make it up, gross incompetence.

The only real evidence for gross incompetence is with those who decide the funding for CaRT ie the taxpayer and government. That is, including you and me.

 

You cannot do preventative maintenance if the budget only stretches to fixing what has gone wrong, however nice it might be to dream otherwise. 

 

By all means use harsh criticism but it helps to direct it where it matters.

20 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Err, I don't think I do. Obviously seemed to fit the bill, now it would be certainly! :banghead:

Assuming it was a judgement call about how to spend scarce resources, what would your choice have been? What other repair would you have left in order to fund this one?

 

Step up to the plate and declare your hand.

 

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4 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:

The only real evidence for gross incompetence is with those who decide the funding for CaRT ie the taxpayer and government. That is, including you and me.

 

You cannot do preventative maintenance if the budget only stretches to fixing what has gone wrong, however nice it might be to dream otherwise. 

 

By all means use harsh criticism but it helps to direct it where it matters.

Assuming it was a judgement call about how to spend scarce resources, what would your choice have been? What other repair would you have left in order to fund this one?

 

Step up to the plate and declare your hand.

 

A man, a board, a few sand bags. And the knowledge of which dump sluice to open to relieve the level.

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I would imagine it failed too quickly to do much about it. The initial problem surely is that the canal level rose so much so fast - I thought they were designed to be self levelling, though the amount of water that came down yesterday was a bit excessive, but there must have been such storms back in the day.

1 minute ago, Tracy D'arth said:

A man, a board, a few sand bags. And the knowledge of which dump sluice to open to relieve the level.

I suspect the sluices don't work. That's why Northwich flooded at the T&M  breach, the majority of the gear to open them was rusted solid.

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25 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:

 

You cannot do preventative maintenance if the budget only stretches to fixing what has gone wrong, however nice it might be to dream otherwise. 

 

Assuming it was a judgement call about how to spend scarce resources, what would your call have been

 

Yesterdays budget was spent on the towpath round here in atrocious conditions, 6 in the team, only 3 actually using their equipment.

20210121_120114.jpg

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And ringing me at home to say they didnt know my boat was my boat, because they cant see the bwb number plates, even though they know  its my boat because its on its mooring.

I said the 40 year old numbers were mangled to death from when they

owned her, and the numbers are painted on the bow.

They offered to laminate up some numbers to put in the windows.

We dont have windows....

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2 hours ago, Mike Todd said:

The only real evidence for gross incompetence is with those who decide the funding for CaRT ie the taxpayer and government. That is, including you and me.

 

You cannot do preventative maintenance if the budget only stretches to fixing what has gone wrong, however nice it might be to dream otherwise. 

 

By all means use harsh criticism but it helps to direct it where it matters.

Assuming it was a judgement call about how to spend scarce resources, what would your choice have been? What other repair would you have left in order to fund this one?

 

Step up to the plate and declare your hand.

 

 

The fixing things budget needs to be increased and the spending on pointless things needs to decreased.

 

Simple

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12 minutes ago, Dave Payne said:

 

The fixing things budget needs to be increased and the spending on pointless things needs to decreased.

 

Simple

 

The've just replaced many signs on the Rochdale with nasty corporate blue ones.  Some of the signs are meaningless, maybe a quirk of history, one is empty it says nothing at all, but its still replaced with a blue one that says nothing at all.

 

............Dave

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13 minutes ago, dmr said:

 

The've just replaced many signs on the Rochdale with nasty corporate blue ones.  Some of the signs are meaningless, maybe a quirk of history, one is empty it says nothing at all, but its still replaced with a blue one that says nothing at all.

 

............Dave

But you are still making the (probably mistaken) assumption that the budget for the canals is all to meet the interests of boaters. The strategy being followed by CaRT is on the premise that a continuing budget, even a smaller one, is critically dependent on keeping a much broader support base in place. 

 

What do you suggest is an alternative - in reality not just what you might wish for?

 

I along with probably most here, would love there to be a more generous budget but, sadly, that ain't goin' to 'appen. It is, judging by electoral statistics, quite likely that some forumites are actually in the camp of reducing the budget, having voted at some stage for a candidate that promises lower taxes and reduced public expenditure.

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3 hours ago, Tracy D'arth said:

A man, a board, a few sand bags. And the knowledge of which dump sluice to open to relieve the level.

 

Considering that the area has been subject to numerous flood warnings, loads of roads closed due to flooding and damage to other structures have you considered that it might have been impossible for anyone to get near?
Or is it just another excuse for you to make an unfounded criticism?

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5 minutes ago, Graham Davis said:

 

Considering that the area has been subject to numerous flood warnings, loads of roads closed due to flooding and damage to other structures have you considered that it might have been impossible for anyone to get near?
Or is it just another excuse for you to make an unfounded criticism?

Somebody got near because they put a photo up on facebook.

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9 minutes ago, furnessvale said:

Somebody got near because they put a photo up on facebook.

 

15 minutes ago, Graham Davis said:

 

Or is it just another excuse for you to make an unfounded criticism?

Or is it just another excuse for you to make an unfounded criticism?

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1 hour ago, Mike Todd said:

But you are still making the (probably mistaken) assumption that the budget for the canals is all to meet the interests of boaters. The strategy being followed by CaRT is on the premise that a continuing budget, even a smaller one, is critically dependent on keeping a much broader support base in place. 

 

What do you suggest is an alternative - in reality not just what you might wish for?

 

I along with probably most here, would love there to be a more generous budget but, sadly, that ain't goin' to 'appen. It is, judging by electoral statistics, quite likely that some forumites are actually in the camp of reducing the budget, having voted at some stage for a candidate that promises lower taxes and reduced public expenditure.

 

I fully understand the plan that they have, though I am not sure its correct, and its certainly not implemented well. Some of the bigger blue signs are even more unpopular with locals and visitors than they are with boaters. Many visitors want to visit the historic character of the canal and the new blue image conflicts with this. Maybe it appeals to the sport cyclists who would like a more modern image but they come to visit the hard surface rather than the cana,l and actually deter some "high quality" pedestrian visitors.

The canals need more involvement from interested members of the public and I am not convinced they are achieving this. I am not a 100% anti-CRT person, some of it is good, the volunteer scheme is great....it gets people who like the canal involved with the canal..

 

.................Dave

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4 hours ago, Arthur Marshall said:

I would imagine it failed too quickly to do much about it. The initial problem surely is that the canal level rose so much so fast - I thought they were designed to be self levelling, though the amount of water that came down yesterday was a bit excessive, but there must have been such storms back in the day.

I suspect the sluices don't work. That's why Northwich flooded at the T&M  breach, the majority of the gear to open them was rusted solid.

If you look there are lots of overflow weirs made out of mass concrete which are obviously not original to the canals. I'd guess BWB had a campaign to build them in the fifties when it first became obvious that retaining lengthsmen locally 24/7 to open the original flood paddles was now hopelessly uneconomic. Lots of the original flood paddles are obviously decomissioned. with missing racks, etc.

 

MP.

 

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50 minutes ago, Graham Davis said:

 On foot!
Still means they would have to get heavy equipment and such to it, and considering the conditions that may not/was not possible,

The photo itself showed how small the original breach was and how repair materials could have been brought in a wheelbarrow.

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36 minutes ago, furnessvale said:

The photo itself showed how small the original breach was and how repair materials could have been brought in a wheelbarrow.

My first thoughts.  It looks to me as though the capping stones have gone. A  panel, of ply, or something similar,  would have been held by pressure against the piling and stopped most of the flow before the flow washed away more of the bank leading to a more serious breach.  Then a slightly better fix, e.g. Tracy’s sandbag or Tony’s wheelbarrow, while they lowered the level of the pound.

 

Would that have stopped a major breach?  As I intimidated at the start of this thread, a lengthsman would have prevented it,  someone in an office scratching their head and wondering who to ask to get the risk assessment done shows the lack of basic understanding we are lumbered with now.

Edited by dor
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20 minutes ago, BEngo said:

it is not to CRT's maintenance contractor's benefit to move quickly.  Fiddly-ass reactive jobs are expensive to do and require too many ad-hoc man-hours to be profitable.  Much better to get a properly costed and fully authorised job, especially if,  by the time it has been fully planned, it has now turned into a much bigger job.

 

CRT North West have been taking a different approach over the last couple of years.  They have put together a rapid reaction team that scoot all over the area to fix reported issues before they get out of hand.  It's a good mix of experienced and new staff and they do seem quite good at heading off some problems.

 

They can't fix the bigger jobs on their own, so these do have to be escalated to contractors, but it seems to work quite well.  I don't know if this is national policy or just a "new broom" idea since the management changed in the North West region, but it seems to work quite well.

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7 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

CRT North West have been taking a different approach over the last couple of years.  They have put together a rapid reaction team that scoot all over the area to fix reported issues before they get out of hand.  It's a good mix of experienced and new staff and they do seem quite good at heading off some problems.

 

I think I have read (somewhere) that there has been a leak at this location for about a year - C&RT were aware and have been 'monitoring it'.

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