boaters target boaters

[Jerra]

The fact that CRT seems to be trying to divide and conquer has b een mentioned. It doesn't need to. I have never come across any group of people who appear (NB appear) to be so divided while pursuing a common interest.

 

People who don't use marinas against those who do, NBs against cruisers, steel against fibre glass, pumpout against cassette etc etc.

 

Until the people who use canals put aside their differences and present a united face to CRT and the world many things they don't want will be brought it.

 

Incidentally Luctor I am sure Nick is buying coal etc regularly just not as often as you do. Once every 10 years can be regular

[nicknorman]

 

I happen to keep my boat in a marina and I object to your sweeping generalisation that I am a nuisance when I take my boat out. I have other responsiblities which preclude me living on a boat on the cut.

 

When we take our boat out we do try to support the little business on and along side the canal. I would hazard a guess that there are more people who keep their boats in marinas than actually live on the cut. If all these boats were suddenly tipped out to be moored on the tow path you would certainly complain then. As Nick has already mentioned do not all those who moor in a marina not contribute vast amounts to C & RT to help support the infrastructure?

 

I should imagine some of your trade is to "nuisance" boats when "they ocassionally come out". If you feel so strongly about us nuisances are you only going to sell your produce to liveaboards only?

Don't worry Ray, Lucky doesn't really mean he despises all marina dwellers, just this one. He is only happy when having a good old rant and moan about something and I am the subject of the moment. I wonder if living aboard makes him like that, or whether he was always thus? No, probably he is just a bit lonely.

 

I'm with Nigel Moore, but then I've read all the relevant threads and actually know the facts behind his court case.

 

I don't understand why anyone would think they can form an opinion, let alone attack him, without being acquainted with all the facts.

 

If that puzzlement makes me nasty then sobeit. I can live with that.

Why would that make you nasty? If posts on this forum were limited to people who were in possession of all the facts, it would be very sparse indeed!

[luctor et emergo]

 

I happen to keep my boat in a marina and I object to your sweeping generalisation that I am a nuisance when I take my boat out. I have other responsiblities which preclude me living on a boat on the cut.

 

When we take our boat out we do try to support the little business on and along side the canal. I would hazard a guess that there are more people who keep their boats in marinas than actually live on the cut. If all these boats were suddenly tipped out to be moored on the tow path you would certainly complain then. As Nick has already mentioned do not all those who moor in a marina not contribute vast amounts to C & RT to help support the infrastructure?

 

I should imagine some of your trade is to "nuisance" boats when "they ocassionally come out". If you feel so strongly about us nuisances are you only going to sell your produce to liveaboards only?

Yes, there are more boats in marinas, then live on the canals. Unfortunately. Boats in marinas pay a lot of money, to cart and to the marina, for just sitting there. They do not spend money every week, keeping local businesses going. Cart wants all boats tucked up in marinas, so they can count the money, without worrying about maintanance. They are replacing their paid staff with volunteers. Who is going to do the specialized work? Ahh, expensive outside contractors.

Ohh,and as you mention it,I can count the amount of business that I do with 'marina based' boats on one hand.

[jenlyn]

Don't worry Ray, Lucky doesn't really mean he despises all marina dwellers, just this one. He is only happy when having a good old rant and moan about something and I am the subject of the moment. I wonder if living aboard makes him like that, or whether he was always thus? No, probably he is just a bit lonely.

 

Why would that make you nasty? If posts on this forum were limited to people who were in possession of all the facts, it would be very sparse indeed!

The thing is Nick, your actually giving Nigel the platform to perform upon, perhaps ultimately to give yourself, the opportunity to perform.

[nicknorman]

Ohh,and as you mention it,I can count the amount of business that I do with 'marina based' boats on one hand.

The difficulty is that our marina shop sells ice cream, which is so much more convenient than waiting for an ice cream boat to come by once in a blue moon. Anyway, I'm getting fat and trying to cut down.

[cotswoldsman]

The fact that CRT seems to be trying to divide and conquer has b een mentioned. It doesn't need to. I have never come across any group of people who appear (NB appear) to be so divided while pursuing a common interest.

 

People who don't use marinas against those who do, NBs against cruisers, steel against fibre glass, pumpout against cassette etc etc.

 

Until the people who use canals put aside their differences and present a united face to CRT and the world many things they don't want will be brought it.

 

Incidentally Luctor I am sure Nick is buying coal etc regularly just not as often as you do. Once every 10 years can be regular

I agree with most of what you say but I guess at the end of the day most of it is based on opinions.

I think the main problem with the divisions with boaters is based on two main reasons:

 

1. They do not understand what is going on so therefor the default position is object

2. They have something I don't have therefor I will object.

[nicknorman]

The thing is Nick, your actually giving Nigel the platform to perform upon, perhaps ultimately to give yourself, the opportunity to perform.

Yes to both but so what?

[jenlyn]

Yes to both but so what?

I was rather hoping you would come back with a reasoned response, you didnt, so I've regrettably chucked you into the "of no further interest" box.

[luctor et emergo]

Don't worry Ray, Lucky doesn't really mean he despises all marina dwellers, just this one. He is only happy when having a good old rant and moan about something and I am the subject of the moment. I wonder if living aboard makes him like that, or whether he was always thus? No, probably he is just a bit lonely.

 

 

Why would that make you nasty? If posts on this forum were limited to people who were in possession of all the facts, it would be very sparse indeed!

I enjoyed our little spat, but like all ill conceived affairs, after the initial exciting rush, it becomes boring and it must come a swift end, when one party gets bored, and sees the other party in the unflattering light of the morning. Go back (sometime) to your hudson, I'm sure you can be happy on your occassional forays. I will have to go back to my humdrum life on my 115 year old boat, traveling up and down the waterway everyday, listening to the battered old Lister banging away in the engine room.

 

Gotta go, business and all that

[nicknorman]

I was rather hoping you would come back with a reasoned response, you didnt, so I've regrettably chucked you into the "of no further interest" box.

The last 2 pages have hardly been reasoned so what did you expect!

 

I enjoyed our little spat, but like all ill conceived affairs, after the initial exciting rush, it becomes boring and it must come a swift end, when one party gets bored, and sees the other party in the unflattering light of the morning. Go back (sometime) to your hudson, I'm sure you can be happy on your occassional forays. I will have to go back to my humdrum life on my 115 year old boat, traveling up and down the waterway everyday, listening to the battered old Lister banging away in the engine room.

Gotta go, business and all that

Fairy Nuff.

 

Ps, not that I have to justify myself, but I just counted the number of days/nights spent on our boat in the past 12 months and it comes to 116 which I think is not bad considering we live 450 miles from our boat. So 1/3 liveaboard!

Edited May 9, 2013 by nicknorman

[BlueStringPudding]

 

 

The grumpy house owners at Giffard Park reported me to BW for running my engine from 7pm till 11pm every night. I didn't get home from work till 8.45pm each evening as it's one git of a commute to London from there. The house owners couldn't see the boat in from of mine behind the bushes so assumed it was mine. I found out they'd reported me because they decided to procrastinate the errors of my ways to me one afternoon - BW certainly didn't care enough to come and give me a ticket and were probably sick of their complaints. When I pointed out the boat in front of mine to them and the fact I'm not even home at the time they say the engine starts each night, they didn't give an apology, just ranted more about the fact they don't want boaters mooring on the canal near their house. Guess which came first? some people are arses.

 

And as for boaters reporting other boaters.... One or more of the boaters who live aboard on some non residential offside moorings at the Tring Summit Level have been known to forget they're breaking regulations themselves, and report boaters on the towpath side for overstaying, running their engine till 8.02pm....

 

Live and let live,I say. Life's too short for all this resentment. It'll only give em a well deserved aneurism later in life.

Edited May 9, 2013 by BlueStringPudding

[Doorman]

 

 

 

John, when I worked for BT/Openreach the upper management were forever changing all sorts of things within the company. It is a management technique.

 

)

More like a technique in existence justification.

 

Having worked in industry for over 23 years and during that time, witnessed complete and utter incompetence from lower management upwards, whereby the shop floor staff were relied upon to rectify their costly errors. I wondered on a daily basis on what techniques other than a particular Golf Club membership, were employed in the selection and promotion of these Wallace & Grommit characters.

 

In particular, when a group of 'higher management' figures where recruited from a sister plant down south, whom in no time were labelled as the Dagenham Mafia, it was patently obvious that intellect and virtue were not high on the list of criterion.

 

Who you knew was far more vital than what you knew, something similar to politics really.

Edited May 9, 2013 by Doorman

[Radiomariner]

The grumpy house owners at Giffard Park reported me to BW for running my engine from 7pm till 11pm every night. I didn't get home from work till 8.45pm each evening as it's one git of a commute to London from there. The house owners couldn't see the boat in from of mine behind the bushes so assumed it was mine. I found out they'd reported me because they decided to procrastinate the errors of my ways to me one afternoon - BW certainly didn't care enough to come and give me a ticket and were probably sick of their complaints. When I pointed out the boat in front of mine to them and the fact I'm not even home at the time they say the engine starts each night, they didn't give an apology, just ranted more about the fact they don't want boaters mooring on the canal near their house. Guess which came first? some people are arses.

 

And as for boaters reporting other boaters.... One or more of the boaters who live aboard on some non residential offside moorings at the Tring Summit Level have been known to forget they're breaking regulations themselves, and report boaters on the towpath side for overstaying, running their engine till 8.02pm....

 

Live and let live,I say. Life's too short for all this resentment. It'll only give em a well deserved aneurism later in life.

A house owner just North of Giffard Park (About 50 to 70 yards North of the Pub) is frequently bothersome. On one particular occasion I moored up just to take some rubbish to the rubbish point, left the engine running as I was only going to be a couple of minutes. As I stepped off the boat with my rubbiish bags, houseowner stormed up to tell me that I am not permitted to run my engine while moored there. "It was bad enough" she said "with boats passing all day, without me mooring up with engine running outside her house!"

BSP I think we have the same person.

She went on on another occasion about mooring up at night where it was possible to see into her upstair bedrooms

Why in heck buy a house by the canal if you cant accept presence of the boats?

About the same distance South of the pub, there is a lady who lets her dog out after dark every night to do it's business on the tow path. As I was walking my dogs back to the boat at the time she did not realise I was a boater. I offered her a "poo bag" to pick up. Her response, "No, I just leave it, helps keeps the boaters from mooring". Thouth fuming inside I resisted the temptation to Rant. I just instead, spoke to the dogs in a loud voice "Back to the boat now, you two" I hoped that might shame her a bit, but she did not "pick up"

Edited May 9, 2013 by Radiomariner

[luctor et emergo]

Next time post the dog shit in her letterbox..

[Laurie Booth]

Next time post the dog shit in her letterbox..

[NigelMoore]

 

. . . Obviously the requirement to licence on that little bit of waterway was technically incorrect, although it would be correct if the boats in question inteded to actually go anywhere as opposed to being used as houses.

 

“Technically incorrect”. Indeed. Are there any other ways in which it could be incorrect?

 

Of course it would be correct to require a boat to obtain a licence if/when it wished to travel up beyond the Gauging Locks; it is not required to have a licence if it is merely intended for that boat to do so at some future time.

 

Nor is it necessary for boats in this location to have a boat licence if they “inteded to actually go anywhere as opposed to being used as houses”; boats do not need a licence from anyone to travel the Thames upstream as far as Teddington, and downstream as far as central London - and the rest of the world from there, if your boat is up to it. Without any disparagement of the canal [trips up to The Fox are a favourite for guests], we enjoy the more varied experience of boating both upstream and downstream on the tidal Thames - cruising through central London, and down to the Barrier and back is an especially exhilarating trip [and with a nod to another recent thread, we always carry VHF and notify the authority both at the start and end of each trip].

[GUMPY]

Next time post the dog shit in her letterbox..

Far more fun is to put it in a brown paper bag place it on her door step set fire to it and ring the door bell.

The house holders natural reaction is to stamp on it to put it out

[Doorman]

Why in heck buy a house by the canal if you cant accept presence of the boats?

 

When we moored on the Rufford Branch of the L&L canal there was a similar home owner near St. Mary's Marina, whom objected to boats mooring on the 48 hour berths. She once approached us to court some support towards her grievance. The stock answer was similar to that of moaning anglers. Live or sit near a railway line and expect trains.

 

There are similar anecdotes where city dwellers occupy their weekend retreats in the country, then complain about farmers on their noisy tractors, or church bells ringing on a Sunday morning. Dick heads the lot of them!

 

How, when they've managed to earn a multitude of money, can they then come out with such verbal diarrhoea and expect to gain sympathy from the locals whom in truth, have developed a lifestyle not dependant simply on wealth creation, but that of quality.

[BlueStringPudding]

A house owner just North of Giffard Park (About 50 to 70 yards North of the Pub) is frequently bothersome. On one particular occasion I moored up just to take some rubbish to the rubbish point, left the engine running as I was only going to be a couple of minutes. As I stepped off the boat with my rubbiish bags, houseowner stormed up to tell me that I am not permitted to run my engine while moored there. "It was bad enough" she said "with boats passing all day, without me mooring up with engine running outside her house!"BSP I think we have the same person.She went on on another occasion about mooring up at night where it was possible to see into her upstair bedroomsWhy in heck buy a house by the canal if you cant accept presence of the boats?About the same distance South of the pub, there is a lady who lets her dog out after dark every night to do it's business on the tow path. As I was walking my dogs back to the boat at the time she did not realise I was a boater. I offered her a "poo bag" to pick up. Her response, "No, I just leave it, helps keeps the boaters from mooring". Thouth fuming inside I resisted the temptation to Rant. I just instead, spoke to the dogs in a loud voice "Back to the boat now, you two" I hoped that might shame her a bit, but she did not "pick up"

This woman griped about boats passing too, yes, sounds like the same woman. Apparently "there's old folk live in those houses and the noise of my engine stops them even being able to hear their tele". I nearly suggested that might be more due to age-related acquired hearing impairments and if anything that should assist in the drowning out of engine noise, but I left it...

[Berengaria]

A home owner in Cropredy who lives just above the lock gave me the same hassle - I'm always very careful about what time I'm running my engine, especially in Winter (as this occasion was). I dunno why, I think because it gets darker earlier I just think to cut it off at 7pm rather than the guideline 8pm.

 

Anyway he comes blustering over, knocking on the boat (I was entertaining friends at the time) and starts going off on one about the engine noise. The moorings were 48 hours but had been rented to me by BW as a winter mooring, which he refused to believe lol.... He even went so far as to state 'I know you lot, you have your own little communities and communes and I've got nothing against that, but the amount of boats coming along here is getting ridiculous.' lol

 

I pointed out to him that I did in fact own a house in the next village and only visited the boat on weekends, but he wouldn't let go.

 

Eventually I asked him how long he'd lived here before the canal came along and spoiled his peace and quiet and he just left.

 

Two days later my boat got broken into....

[Gingerbeer]

Not sure if this was covered in any of the 16 pages because I didn't want to read all the banter, banter, blah, blah, so what about those boats on the canal that are not registered or are damaged and sinking? Does the CRT know how many boats are just sitting on the canals, taking up good mooring space whose registration has run out this year, last year, or earlier? Does anyone on this forum ever let them know or do you just ignore and carry on?

 

I took a short cruise on the Lancaster last week and saw a few boats not currently registered, looking like crap, some filled on both ends with junk. Another very small NB is half sinking just outside a marina in Garstang. It has been there over two months because we like to go there and walk...this time we were on a boat and nothing has changed with it; its still there half sunk. I know I am new and don't own a boat yet, but someday I will and it will really bug me if I have to pay my fees on time and keep currant while someone else just parks their boat and leaves it to rot (which most seem to be doing).

 

So, my questions are: Does anyone let the CRT know about these boats? Does anyone care enough to let them know? Does the CRT care? What do they do with the boats once they find one abandoned and/or out of date?

[Starcoaster]

As has been asked many times when people cite that some scruffy looking boat is unlicenced (I assume this is what you mean by 'registered?') how do you know that they are unlicenced? Did you run them all through the licence checker?

Edited October 15, 2013 by Starcoaster

[Daiboy]

I really do not think this thread is a matter of boatman against boatmen. Again I have only read the last 3 pages but would ask, if you noticed a vehicle without an up to date tax disc, would you report it to the police. You and I pay for the vehicle tax every year without fail. I certainly would report this vehicle. What the police do with this information we cannot know.

 

The same then can apply to CRT and all the other registration and licence providers. We can report but will never know the outcome. The same applies as the vehicle comparison. If I saw a craft without a displayed licence or registration in the window, I would report said craft. This way I am, in a small way, helping to rid the canals and rivers of the dross that seem to be multiplying. Whether it does any good or if indeed the authorities do anything with this information supplied is another matter.

[Ex- Member]

I know of a boat locally that's badly listing and looks abandoned, it is licenced though, but not displaying as such, the fact it's been in the same place for over 2 months though is a matter for C&RT IMO

 

It is moored in the rough and not really harming anyone or getting in any ones way and doesn't seem to be leaking anything. It hasn't received any kind of notice as far as I know either, but we haven't seen anyone from C&RT on this particular part of the tow path. I'm sure though someone has reported it to C&RT we noted someone photographing the boat and boat number close up. Photographed our boat as well when the person thought we weren't aware or on board, they looked rather put out when I quickly popped out the stern exclaiming good afternoon LOL the nosy parker soon scurried off mumbling i know not what LOL

 

There's always some busy body somewhere who will be on the lookout so I suspect C&RT will know well about such boats and they may well be legally on the water anyway.

 

Added (anyway)

Edited October 15, 2013 by Julynian

[madcat]

I've avoided this forum because I got royally fed up of the attitude of some posters, its all here on this thread.