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London boaters fight for moorings


Boaty Jo

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I was intrigued to notice some quite large and rather old signs by the towpath near Notting Hell/Kensal green area of the GU

 

The notice was informing people that the area was managed by London borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It seemed to be referring to the towpath. 

 

Another thing which would be good about LA running towpath is they would be maintaining it for locals rather than random passers by who happen to have boats. Things like vegetation management etc. 

 

Also they could consult with locals and find out if people actually do want to have boats moored long term on the towpath. A lot of people claim that boats are a bonus but the reality might be slightly different. It should be up to local people how their areas are managed. 

 

I believe that towpaths throughout the country should be managed by LA and be their legal responsibility to deal with activities arising. Mooring, angling, amenity use, littering etc. 

 

At the end of the day it's a linear park. Providing more access for locals in canoes and general enjoyable things seems quite a wise approach to me. 

 

Let CRT concentrate on the navigation. Why should my CRT license fees be used to mow a path which is predominantly used by locals? It don't make sense. 

 

 

Edited by magnetman
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55 minutes ago, magnetman said:

I was intrigued to notice some quite large and rather old signs by the towpath near Notting Hell/Kensal green area of the GU

 

The notice was informing people that the area was managed by London borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It seemed to be referring to the towpath. 

 

Another thing which would be good about LA running towpath is they would be maintaining it for locals rather than random passers by who happen to have boats. Things like vegetation management etc. 

 

Also they could consult with locals and find out if people actually do want to have boats moored long term on the towpath. A lot of people claim that boats are a bonus but the reality might be slightly different. It should be up to local people how their areas are managed. 

 

I believe that towpaths throughout the country should be managed by LA and be their legal responsibility to deal with activities arising. Mooring, angling, amenity use, littering etc. 

 

At the end of the day it's a linear park. Providing more access for locals in canoes and general enjoyable things seems quite a wise approach to me. 

 

Let CRT concentrate on the navigation. Why should my CRT license fees be used to mow a path which is predominantly used by locals? It don't make sense. 

 

 

But CRT was set up largely as a "park with water" organisation, which is how it differed from BW. And LAs can't even afford to maintain their own parks,  pavements and roads let alone miles of towpath. I'm not sure ratepayers would appreciate a whacking great increase to pay for it.

Plus, of course, the towpaths are integral to use of the canal. A collapsed towpath tends to let the water out - getting another fifty organisations involved in maintenance may not be wise.

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5 hours ago, Bod said:

C&RT may have no powers to "Fine" as such, but they do have the power to put you in front of a Magistrate, who does, and gets you a criminal record.

 

Bod

Not for overstaying on a mooring or not cruising around enough though. Which is what were talking about.

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4 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Of course that means CRT (and BW before them) don't get money from the fine, so they don't bother using this power.

 

Penalty charges they get to keep...

That's why I posted about the question of whether CRT " charges" were in fact fines and unlawful.  

 

 

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6 hours ago, magnetman said:

Why should my CRT license fees be used to mow a path which is predominantly used by locals? It don't make sense. 

They don't get anywhere near paying for maintaining navigation so all boaters are in fact being subsidised. The canals are there for everyone to enjoy and some form of public funding is reasonable and necessary.

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7 hours ago, Paul C said:

Its probably a workable idea, but the penalty for mooring in a permanent mooring place (with no permit) would need to be the same as (or proportionate to) the penalty for overstaying a CRT-retained stretch of towpath or visitor mooring; and equally enforced too. There is no current provision in law for them to do this but if a new law were to be drafted to allow them to hand over control to the LA, maybe it could be written into that.

 

Of course, NBTA would totally not see the logic and reasoning, and simply say that "swathes of moorings they're entitled to are being taken away converted to unaffordable ones".

 

NBTA are interesting - they don't have a mandate from their "membership" (there is no election or democratic process internally) so CRT and LAs could simply press on ahead and not see them as a stakeholder at all. There is a need for boater representation in these types of plannings/decisions though, so they could optionally invite them to the table which is what I believe CRT's current approach is.

 

Of course they're only entitled to them -- in the accurate meaning of the word -- if they follow the CCing rules, which they agreed to when they paid for a license but the NBTA campaigns against having to follow... 😉

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4 minutes ago, Goliath said:

Stopped debating anything with you along time ago.

Seems one can have any view one wants, as long as it’s IanD’s 😉 

Nope, you can have any view you want, but other people are allowed to have different ones. My view of the NBTA is shared by many other boaters -- hence the "No Boats Travelling Anywhere" label that some keep applying -- but obviously not you, and not NBTA supporters/members.

 

Playground insults however are either a mark of immaturity or a sign that you've lost the argument... 😉

Edited by IanD
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On 01/07/2022 at 11:05, IanD said:

 

Having spent plenty of time recently in various pubs in London and also places like Brum and Sheffield, I can confirm that beer (real ale, not lager) *is* more expensive in London -- anything under £5 a pint is a bonus, and some places are over £6, compared to perhaps £3.50-£4.50 typical in the Midlands and North -- so maybe £1.50 a pint more expensive.

 

Which shouldn't be any surprise given the higher costs of running a pub in London (rent/rates/lease/wages). A friend of mine who's just left a job as a pub manager was always complaining about this...

£5 a pint or more is now the norm in central Birmingham pubs, other than 'spoons.  Much the same as it is in central London.  Parts of the Noth may be cheaper, just as the Black Country is cheaper.  But I'll bet central Manchester and Leeds is £5 a pint now too.

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2 minutes ago, doratheexplorer said:

£5 a pint or more is now the norm in central Birmingham pubs, other than 'spoons.  Much the same as it is in central London.  Parts of the Noth may be cheaper, just as the Black Country is cheaper.  But I'll bet central Manchester and Leeds is £5 a pint now too.

 

Not when I was there last year... 😉

 

Unless you go into the expensive bars that specialise in overpriced craft beers and lagers. Good real ale pubs tend to be cheaper...

 

(the one I go to most often in Hammersmith currently charges £4.80 for an always-excellent pint of Hophead)

Edited by IanD
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6 minutes ago, doratheexplorer said:

A lot has changed since last year.  Hadn't you noticed?

Yes. Prices from Sheffield were three weeks ago, London was last week, as was Exeter. All have gone up a bit since last year, about 30p a pint IIRC, and I don't expect the price differential between places (including Manchester and Leeds) would have changed differently -- why should it?

 

Morris teams (see my avatar) spend a lot of time in pubs all over the country, and beer prices are one of the perennial subjects of discussion... 😉

Edited by IanD
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This morning I was taken by a small group to the nearest spoons, 16 miles away. We went for a natter more than anything else. I avoid spoons like the plague, not my scene at all. So we went on the FREE coach which was my first time on a bus for countless years. Twas comfy, nearly empty and direct with no stops, so far so good. Then into spoons, welll nearly straight in, we did have to avoid the smokers stood actualy in the doorway and climb over a small pile of fag ends they throw on the floor, plonkers. The venue itself was clean, toilets immaculate, staff very friendly but no where near enough of them as there was plenty of customers, as in lots. So I ordered the large brekky at 5.40 and had a very nice pint of Abbot at 2.10. Beers spot on and brekky good enough especialy at the price. For dessert I had a very nice, cold guinness at 2.85. 

There is zero atmosphere as it was more like a barn than my kind of pub. To sum up would I go again. Well yes I would, but never for anything other than a cheap quick meal and a couple of beers. Cant knock it for the price but they only appeal on price alone. The nearest pub a few yards away was closed with the usual " Run your own pub " sign affixed theiron. It will remain so in my opinion, having run such venues they have zero chance of making a living near to the spoons. We are out again next monday and its my choice of venue, it will not be spoons, but we will spend considerably more money. Had I got small kids these days I would certainly go there, vastly better than Macdonalds for instance.

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On 03/07/2022 at 09:42, agg221 said:

You could do that, but I wasn't thinking quite so radically. I was thinking of CRT granting a lease of the towpath and mooring rights to an agreed width to the Local Authorities. I envisaged a public right of access to the towpath being part of the terms. My thought was that CRT would then continue to be the navigation authority so travelling boaters would continue to have use of the canal as they currently do (in theory) but since the LAs would hold a lease on the moorings then CCing would no longer apply. I would imagine that having a valid licence, BSS and insurance would still remain conditions. In that respect, it would be no different to any other fixed mooring operated on privately held land/CRT waters (I can't rock up to a marina and refuse to pay for a berth because I am CCing).

 

How the boaters, NBTA and the LAs interacted would be a different question - I imagine it would not be universally popular, since it would move from 'free' to 'not free' but how much protest and how legitimate it was would depend on the attitude the LAs took. If they were paying CRT for the lease and incurring costs from management then I would anticipate they would want to charge, however it would not be in their interests to make the charge punitive since they would benefit most from keeping the moorings full, and would not benefit from over-charging to the point where they had to take with one hand and give back with the other in the form of housing benefit. This is where my thought above around defining the area for dedicated social housing came from, with a pricing structure to reflect this.

 

The point of fine vs. fixed penalty notices is well made. The latter would be more beneficial to CRT and, since it already has a mechanism to collect money through the annual licence, this led to my thought of simply adding fixed penalty notice charges to the next licence fee. Failure to pay in full would result in no licence being issued and there is already a mechanism for dealing with unlicensed boats.

 

@magnetman I take your point that most people in this position are not choosing to live on a boat but are making a compromise. I don't have figures to back this, but my anticipation is that this leads to a somewhat transient population as people decide they have had enough of the compromise. This is not necessarily a bad thing - it creates a degree of churn, which is the point I was making to @Alan de Enfield as a major difference from the situation on the Cam which has very limited churn due to other options being available, so those who have chosen to live there stay for very long periods with a consequent extended waiting list. I don't think the fact that it is a compromise necessarily has much impact on alternative management strategies though, so long as people continue to want to try that compromise in the current numbers.

 

Alec

Not lawful with the current legislation. ( 1995 BW act )

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3 minutes ago, Paul C said:

 

Are you indirectly implying that the current legislation is inadequate to deal with this?

No, im saying a PB licence cannot be refused renewal due to owing CRT money for any other fees or charges.

 

( not including licence fees obviously before someone chips in.)

 

 

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1 minute ago, Paul C said:

So looking at the wider picture, given they don't have the ability to do this...........should they just let the status-quo in London continue?

 

 

Well I suspect waterworks, the NBTA and CMers in general would say YES. Why wouldn't they? The current situation suits them just fine and any attempt to improve it is bound to be met with an avalanche of opposition given they are the beneficiaries of how it is now. 

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