Winter Mooring - CRT miles per year still needed?

[Iain_S]

5 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

I'm not sure I agree with that - I believe that the 'Range' is actually a radius rather than the diameter.

Take a rifle which has a 'range' of 1 mile.

Stand pointing North and the bullet will travel 1 mile, now turn and face South, and the bullet will travel 1 mile.

 

The range in both cases is 1 mile, but the circle has a diameter of 2 miles.

But the shooter who has moved to the edge of the circle needs a 2 mile range to get close to the target on the diametrically opposite edge.

[David Schweizer]

7 hours ago, BWM said:

I can't imagine why 20 odd miles would be daunting to anyone, as it is not difficult to cover such a distance in a day!

 

I would be interested to learn on whch canal you have been able to travel 20 miles in one day. On most canals, this would entail cruising for something like seven continuous hours without slowing down for moored boats, working any lock,s or taking any rest breaks. When estimating how long a journey will take, I much prefer to use lock/miles as an indicator, with three per hour being a reasonable average without hold ups. I still have all my cruising logs, which I have just checked,  and I rarely acheved 20 miles in one eight hour day, except on the Thames, and I don't hang about!

[Nightwatch]

I’m in Kent at the moment. The boat is in Oxfordshire. That’s more than 21 miles.

[CanalRetentive]

21 minutes ago, David Schweizer said:

 

I would be interested to learn on whch canal you have been able to travel 20 miles in one day. On most canals, this would entail cruising for something like seven continuous hours without slowing down for moored boats, working any lock,s or taking any rest breaks. When estimating how long a journey will take, I much prefer to use lock/miles as an indicator, with three per hour being a reasonable average without hold ups. I still have all my cruising logs, which I have just checked,  and I rarely acheved 20 miles in one eight hour day, except on the Thames, and I don't hang about!

Quite, when I first started I believed the canalplan times, I soon learnt! If you have the decency to slow down when passing other boats and you're not in the middle of nowhere progress can be painfully slow. 

[Alan de Enfield]

24 minutes ago, David Schweizer said:

 

I would be interested to learn on whch canal you have been able to travel 20 miles in one day. On most canals, this would entail cruising for something like seven continuous hours without slowing down for moored boats, working any lock,s or taking any rest breaks. When estimating how long a journey will take, I much prefer to use lock/miles as an indicator, with three per hour being a reasonable average without hold ups. I still have all my cruising logs, which I have just checked,  and I rarely acheved 20 miles in one eight hour day, except on the Thames, and I don't hang about!

 

As you say- easily achieved on Rivers, of which for some, C&RT are the navigation authority.

 

When on the canals I doubt there were many days when we cruised where we achieved less than 10 miles, so maybe better to say 'I can do in two days what C&RT expect a CCer to do in 12 months'.

Edited January 28, 2022 by Alan de Enfield

[booke23]

8 hours ago, BWM said:

I can't imagine why 20 odd miles would be daunting to anyone, as it is not difficult to cover such a distance in a day!

In the summer definitely, however perhaps a bit trickier in the middle of winter. 

I remember Chas Hardern telling me about a trip he did on his camping boat in the summer of 1976 from his base at Beeston Wharf to Limehouse basin and back. He returned via the tidal Thames (He showed me a pic of him at tower bridge on the boat).

He did the trip in THREE weeks! Including a 12 mile side trip up the K & A .......according to canal plan that's nearly 450 miles. He said they cruised from first light until dusk, so cruised at least 16hrs per day and he had crew to pass him sandwiches and drinks!

 

Edited January 28, 2022 by booke23

[Mike Adams]

I don't know why CaRT put up with all this continuous cruising nonsense. Navigation is either for commercial use or Pleasure. I am sure that when the Idea arose CCing was invented for a group of people who could afford to go pleasure cruising continuously. When I started cruising some 50 years ago the idea that  you would stay in one place more than 24 hours unless there was a stoppage or a Rally seemed unusual. You generally wanted to explore as much of the system as you could and a 9 hour day was normal and I remember working down from Farmers Bridge to below Hatton in one long day. You were always on a journey. Of course working around London was two days as the only safe mooring was Little Venice. If CaRT want to turn the canals into low cost housing they might as well get on with it, provide proper facilities and charge for moorings and give houseboats some security.

[dmr]

7 minutes ago, Mike Adams said:

I don't know why CaRT put up with all this continuous cruising nonsense. Navigation is either for commercial use or Pleasure. I am sure that when the Idea arose CCing was invented for a group of people who could afford to go pleasure cruising continuously. When I started cruising some 50 years ago the idea that  you would stay in one place more than 24 hours unless there was a stoppage or a Rally seemed unusual. You generally wanted to explore as much of the system as you could and a 9 hour day was normal and I remember working down from Farmers Bridge to below Hatton in one long day. You were always on a journey. Of course working around London was two days as the only safe mooring was Little Venice. If CaRT want to turn the canals into low cost housing they might as well get on with it, provide proper facilities and charge for moorings and give houseboats some security.

 

I don't know why CaRT put up with all these part time amateur hobby boaters, clogging up the canals in summer and causing congestion, rushing from pub to pub, and sometimes not even having proper control of their boats. I think the canals should only be used by full time livaboard boaters who have made the commitment to the waterways and want to preserve them and the quiet way of life.😀😀

 

[matty40s]

1 hour ago, booke23 said:

In the summer definitely, however perhaps a bit trickier in the middle of winter. 

I remember Chas Hardern telling me about a trip he did on his camping boat in the summer of 1976 from his base at Beeston Wharf to Limehouse basin and back. He returned via the tidal Thames (He showed me a pic of him at tower bridge on the boat).

He did the trip in THREE weeks! Including a 12 mile side trip up the K & A .......according to canal plan that's nearly 450 miles. He said they cruised from first light until dusk, so cruised at least 16hrs per day and he had crew to pass him sandwiches and drinks!

 

That's my kind of boating, and Chas was also the first hire company we used when I was a youngster. 

[David Mack]

42 minutes ago, Mike Adams said:

I am sure that when the Idea arose CCing was invented for a group of people who could afford to go pleasure cruising continuously.

Indeed. In the run up to what became the 1995 Act, British Waterways proposed that all boats should have to have a home mooring. Some individual boaters and boating organisations objected, arguing that there were a few people who did indeed cruise continuously and extensively for most or all of the year and had no need of a permanent mooring, being unconstrained by the need to be in one place for employment, education or other reasons. Such people were either retired, or of independent means i.e. reasonably wealthy, or had a job that could be carried out almost entirely from the boat. And in a pre-internet age that was limited to writers, artists and the like who didn't need significant quantities of electricity or space to carry out their activity. At the time nobody really considered liveaboards who might move only shortish distances over a limited area to stay within reach of a workplace etc.

The result was the addition to the Act that no home mooring was needed if the boat stayed in one place for no more than 14 days (or such longer period as is reasonable in the circumstances), with the onus clearly placed on the boater to satisfy the Board that this is indeed the case.  This addition was a last minute fudge to get the Bill through, with the result that 'place' was not adequately defined, neither was any requirement stated as to how extensively a boat had to travel, or how soon it could return to a previous location. 

And the result has been that neither boaters nor BW/CRT has had clarity as to where the boundary between compliance and non-compliance lies. And when BW/CRT have tried to define this boundary more precisely, the courts have struck down some of that definition. So CRT can only effectively chase the most obviously non-compliant, hence statements that a range of less than 20 miles in a year will put you on the enforcement radar, without giving any guidance as to how much more range would definitely be acceptable.

 

[Rob-M]

2 hours ago, David Schweizer said:

 

I would be interested to learn on whch canal you have been able to travel 20 miles in one day. On most canals, this would entail cruising for something like seven continuous hours without slowing down for moored boats, working any lock,s or taking any rest breaks. When estimating how long a journey will take, I much prefer to use lock/miles as an indicator, with three per hour being a reasonable average without hold ups. I still have all my cruising logs, which I have just checked,  and I rarely acheved 20 miles in one eight hour day, except on the Thames, and I don't hang about!

I've gone from Icknield Port to Walsall basin via the Wyrley and Essington in one day which is over 20 miles and eleven locks.   A summer boating day would be 8 - 10 hours so 20 miles and some locks isn't an issue.

[dmr]

23 minutes ago, Rob-M said:

I've gone from Icknield Port to Walsall basin via the Wyrley and Essington in one day which is over 20 miles and eleven locks.   A summer boating day would be 8 - 10 hours so 20 miles and some locks isn't an issue.

 

Yes it can be done, and we have done Hatton and Lapworth flights in a single day as a bit of fun, but CC'ing is not like doing hireboating 365 days a year and the objective is not to travel as far as possible every single day and then end up eating and drinking in the pub.

Amongst the bizarre question that the public ask of boaters, one of the more unusual was "It must be a really good life going to the pub and eating out every day of the year"

 

If we did 10 hours a day in the summer (or half of the year) that would be 1825 hours of boating and so 1825 litres of diesel and 9 engine services.

 

[booke23]

1 hour ago, matty40s said:

That's my kind of boating, and Chas was also the first hire company we used when I was a youngster. 

 

Ditto! In fact just over a year ago you painted the first boat I ever hired. 

 

 

 

[dmr]

42 minutes ago, David Mack said:

Indeed. In the run up to what became the 1995 Act, British Waterways proposed that all boats should have to have a home mooring. Some individual boaters and boating organisations objected, arguing that there were a few people who did indeed cruise continuously and extensively for most or all of the year and had no need of a permanent mooring, being unconstrained by the need to be in one place for employment, education or other reasons. Such people were either retired, or of independent means i.e. reasonably wealthy, or had a job that could be carried out almost entirely from the boat. And in a pre-internet age that was limited to writers, artists and the like who didn't need significant quantities of electricity or space to carry out their activity. At the time nobody really considered liveaboards who might move only shortish distances over a limited area to stay within reach of a workplace etc.

The result was the addition to the Act that no home mooring was needed if the boat stayed in one place for no more than 14 days (or such longer period as is reasonable in the circumstances), with the onus clearly placed on the boater to satisfy the Board that this is indeed the case.  This addition was a last minute fudge to get the Bill through, with the result that 'place' was not adequately defined, neither was any requirement stated as to how extensively a boat had to travel, or how soon it could return to a previous location. 

And the result has been that neither boaters nor BW/CRT has had clarity as to where the boundary between compliance and non-compliance lies. And when BW/CRT have tried to define this boundary more precisely, the courts have struck down some of that definition. So CRT can only effectively chase the most obviously non-compliant, hence statements that a range of less than 20 miles in a year will put you on the enforcement radar, without giving any guidance as to how much more range would definitely be acceptable.

 

 

This is true, and I like to think that the "bonefide" thing was a last minute change made in the local pub in order to save the bill. However as a child I am sure I walked some of the Stratford Canal (or maybe the Grand Union) and saw loads of hippies in decrepit old boats looking very static, so the concept of continuous moorers was not unknown.

[Tacet]

5 hours ago, MtB said:

 

Point of Order...

 

A bullet does not travel in straight lines, it travels in (what I think is probably) a parabola due to the effect of gravity. 

 

Jusss sayin'! 

The velocity of the bullet will reduce in the linear direction - whilst the vertical acceleration will remain constant.  So not a parabola

 

Juss saying - but not expressed at all well.

 

 

[matty40s]

57 minutes ago, Rob-M said:

I've gone from Icknield Port to Walsall basin via the Wyrley and Essington in one day which is over 20 miles and eleven locks.   A summer boating day would be 8 - 10 hours so 20 miles and some locks isn't an issue.

I did a mid March trip- Keadby to Fiskerton in a single day(56 miles and 4 locks) followed by the next day to Zouch(33 miles and 14 locks), however wouldnt recommend it for CCing as it was a long way to go back for a car.....

 

[dave moore]

As an old boater advised the wartime trainees...” Goo stiddy but keep gooin “ still sound advice today.....

[MtB]

11 minutes ago, dave moore said:

As an old boater advised the wartime trainees...” Goo stiddy but keep gooin “ still sound advice today.....

 

I really don't get it. What IS this obsession with never stopping and doing massive distances in a day?

 

When I'm out cruising I stop repeatedly. Whenever I see something on the bank I'm interested in, I stop and have a closer look. Often I'll moor up and make a cuppa. Then drink it enjoying the surroundings before setting off again.

 

I mean, like, what's the hurry? (As all those home moorers love shouting at me as I creep past them at 1 mph...) 

1 hour ago, Tacet said:

The velocity of the bullet will reduce in the linear direction - whilst the vertical acceleration will remain constant.  So not a parabola

 

Juss saying - but not expressed at all well.

 

 

 

Indeed, as I commented a few posts further on from the one you quoted. 

 

A strange shaped curve. I wonder if it has a name. 

[ditchcrawler]

13 minutes ago, MtB said:

When I'm out cruising I stop repeatedly. Whenever I see something on the bank I'm interested in, I stop and have a closer look. Often I'll moor up and make a cuppa. Then drink it enjoying the surroundings before setting off again.

 

But do you manage 20 miles in a year

[sueb]

2 hours ago, David Mack said:

Indeed. In the run up to what became the 1995 Act, British Waterways proposed that all boats should have to have a home mooring. Some individual boaters and boating organisations objected, arguing that there were a few people who did indeed cruise continuously and extensively for most or all of the year and had no need of a permanent mooring, being unconstrained by the need to be in one place for employment, education or other reasons. Such people were either retired, or of independent means i.e. reasonably wealthy, or had a job that could be carried out almost entirely from the boat. And in a pre-internet age that was limited to writers, artists and the like who didn't need significant quantities of electricity or space to carry out their activity. At the time nobody really considered liveaboards who might move only shortish distances over a limited area to stay within reach of a workplace etc.

The result was the addition to the Act that no home mooring was needed if the boat stayed in one place for no more than 14 days (or such longer period as is reasonable in the circumstances), with the onus clearly placed on the boater to satisfy the Board that this is indeed the case.  This addition was a last minute fudge to get the Bill through, with the result that 'place' was not adequately defined, neither was any requirement stated as to how extensively a boat had to travel, or how soon it could return to a previous location. 

And the result has been that neither boaters nor BW/CRT has had clarity as to where the boundary between compliance and non-compliance lies. And when BW/CRT have tried to define this boundary more precisely, the courts have struck down some of that definition. So CRT can only effectively chase the most obviously non-compliant, hence statements that a range of less than 20 miles in a year will put you on the enforcement radar, without giving any guidance as to how much more range would definitely be acceptable.

 

Another important fact was that marina moorings were scarce at the time. It would have created more problems if boaters had taken moorings and then not used them, which is what would have happened.

[Alan de Enfield]

5 minutes ago, sueb said:

Another important fact was that marina moorings were scarce at the time. It would have created more problems if boaters had taken moorings and then not used them, which is what would have happened.

 

And once you have a mooring there is no obligation to use it .............................

 

HHJ Halbert

 

6:3 There are clear anomalies in both positions, CRT clearly regard the occupation of moorings by permanently residential boat owners who do not move very much as a significant problem (see paragraphs 3.5 and 3.6 above). However, neither the statutory regime in subsection 17(3) nor the guidelines can deal with this problem. A boat which has a home mooring is not required to be “bona fide” used for navigation throughout the period of the licence, but neither is it required to ever use its home mooring. The act requires that the mooring is available, it does not say it must be used. The guidelines also have this effect. The boat is still subject to the restriction that it must not stay in the same place for more than 14 days but there is nothing whatever to stop it being shuffled between two locations quite close together provided they are far enough apart to constitute different places. If those who are causing the overcrowding at popular spots have home moorings anywhere in the country the present regime cannot control their overuse of the popular spots. Such an owner could cruise to and fro along the Kennet & Avon canal near Bristol and the home mooring could be in Birmingham and totally unused.

[LadyG]

58 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

But do you manage 20 miles in a year

I would not have bought a boat if I had been forced to pay marina prices, I never wanted to live in a marina, I wanted to bona fide navigate, and I still do, it's affordable due to Ts and Cs,  else I would not have bought a boat. I am not the only one, might be thousands like me. 

Twenty miles per annum is not bona fide navigation, in my opinion, it indicates someone who needs to be in one place and shuffles their boat to and fro to satisfy an artificial, but  now legal, constraint. 

23 hours ago, Monnie said:

Hello I was just wondering could anybody please tell me if I had a winter mooring would I still need to satisfy the CRT miles per year requirement? 

Why don't you ask the CRT? 

[MtB]

11 minutes ago, LadyG said:

Why don't you ask the CRT? 

 

My reading of the situation is the OP has been being wound up ovr CRT rules by the other boaters she said she is cruising with, and probably called CRT but didn't like the answer, so is asking here hoping for answers more in line with tow-path rumour.

[Mike Adams]

21 minutes ago, LadyG said:

Hello I was just wondering could anybody please tell me if I had a winter mooring would I still need to satisfy the CRT miles per year requirement? 

I have never noticed if the winter moorings are residential or not. I assume that they are not since it would require planning permission which I don't think has been obtained by CaRT. So can you technically  live on your boat at a winter mooring? I assumed they were just to leave your CC boat while you went off and did something else. If you take a winter mooring you are technically no longer CCing so the requirement is removed.

[LadyG]

17 minutes ago, Mike Adams said:

I have never noticed if the winter moorings are residential or not. I assume that they are not since it would require planning permission which I don't think has been obtained by CaRT. So can you technically  live on your boat at a winter mooring? I assumed they were just to leave your CC boat while you went off and did something else. If you take a winter mooring you are technically no longer CCing so the requirement is removed.

Oi you, porridge stirred extra-ordinaire, please edit your previous

post!!!!!! 

Edited January 28, 2022 by LadyG