Didn't really know what to say !!

[pete harrison]

Nothing new at all. From all accounts, commercial carrying boatmen were extremely selfish, and rightly so. Pairs would stop for the night in the mouth of a lock, to guarantee their "Road" in the morning; you would strive as hard as possible to prevent anyone getting by and taking your road; and you would generally only close up behind and draw a.paddle if it was a mate who was buttying you.

 

There's even stories of boatmen dropping coils of wire into bridgeholes to slow up or stop people chasing.

 

There were times, apparently, when some would help by snatching off the mud to correct mistakes, or give other small kindnesses.

 

That's how it worked, according to some. Any newcomers had to work very hard to be accepted; it was expected that everyone would be out for themselves, to get them ahead, because they had to. You were expected to be able to handle yourself and your boat/s; if you couldn't cope with a bad Road, with locks empty and set against you, there would be no hope.

 

Of course there were often social events where all differences were put aside, but there are also tales of late night carousing dancing and toasting at a boaters' wedding dissolving into 3am starts and races to the closest lock.

 

It's certainly not new.

I often think their are more stories about how things were done by 'commercial carrying boatmen' than there were boats, and I certainly do not believe half of them.

 

I came to the canals about 45 years ago, and back then there were quite a few unpleasant characters, both making their living and recreationally, just as I would expect in all walks of life. I do not understand why today's boaters have an expectation for every other boater to be pleasant and polite.

[Tony Dunkley]

That's how it worked, according to some. Any newcomers had to work very hard to be accepted; it was expected that everyone would be out for themselves, to get them ahead, because they had to. You were expected to be able to handle yourself and your boat/s; if you couldn't cope with a bad Road, with locks empty and set against you, there would be no hope.

 

 

 

Thanks for posting that, maybe it will help to dispel some modern misconceptions.

Having previously worked since leaving school on other types of commercial vessels in the North West, as one of those newcomers to working narrowboats in the South East in the 1960's, "trainees" as we were branded, and having to prove ourselves worthy to be accepted into the working boat community, I can vouch for what you've said.

Courtesy on it's own would just get you laughed off the cut, and I saw it happen to some. There had to be a willingness, not only to work hard, but to do it right, together with an apptitude for learning every aspect of how to work boats the way those born and bred to it did. If you looked like making the grade you were given all the help, encouragement and tuition you could ever wish for, but those same people who had taught you well enough to be able to keep pace with them would be unmerciless in what they would do to get ahead of you to load or empty, or to get a good "road", and unless they were better handed (more people working the pair) they would be equally contemptuous of you if you were to let them get past.

Relevant to this thread, and probably surprising to some, is that looking for leakage while working a lock, and shutting the gates behind you but only if necessary, was normal everyday practice, as was drawing off a lock to protect water levels in a pound or a summit late at night or if you were likely to be the last pair of boats through. It was also common practice for well handed pairs of boats (worked by three or more) to start locks filling or emptying behind them if they were immediately ahead of a two handed pair, even if they'd just caught up and got ahead of them.

Nowadays the pointless closing of gates has evolved into some sort of unthinking, pleasure boating fairyland etiquette, that has made the 50/50 chance that the next lock may be ready with the gates standing open for you to go straight in, into a dead certainty that it won't be ready.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Tony Dunkley

[rufus2015]

Thinking about it logically, and taking into account it was a practice the old time boatmen found was the best overall way to go, leaving gates open as a rule is still valid. If there are certain locks that need to be closed then they can be signposted giving the reason why. If the gates leak then CRT should repair them, not make boaters work harder so they can devote the money to other priorities. ( like Richard Parry's pension pot )

 

Many boaters don't seem to understand why it is the best practice. They assume its rude to leave the door open, but its a general rule that helps everyone achieve the nirvana of arriving at locks set in your favour. I would never complain if gates were left open by anyone else. Well done I say.

[mayalld]

I normally close gates behind me, but as a single hander if I'm being caught up by fully crewed boats behind me then I'll leave them open if they are awkward to increase my speed and reduce theirs to keep us in balance. If they generously come and help me as does occasionally happen then there is no need.

 

I have stopped opening a paddle for a following boat when circumstances would have suggested it, after several instances of the following boat stopping short despite the location being highly inappropriate.

The other week, we were following a single hander, who was closing up, and setting back for us.

 

This was slowing things down, so I went to him and suggested that he kept going, and I would close up for him and set for us.

 

Made life a whole load easier all round.

[nicknorman]

Thinking about it logically, and taking into account it was a practice the old time boatmen found was the best overall way to go, leaving gates open as a rule is still valid. If there are certain locks that need to be closed then they can be signposted giving the reason why. If the gates leak then CRT should repair them, not make boaters work harder so they can devote the money to other priorities. ( like Richard Parry's pension pot )

Many boaters don't seem to understand why it is the best practice. They assume its rude to leave the door open, but its a general rule that helps everyone achieve the nirvana of arriving at locks set in your favour. I would never complain if gates were left open by anyone else. Well done I say.

 

No, you misconstrue. It is all very well saying locks shouldn't leak, but it is also true that there shouldn't be world poverty, war, violence etc. a nice idea but totally detached from reality. This is why gates and paddles should be closed on exit (except on rivers), as per CRT's boaters handbook etc. When that is normal practice as it is, those not complying are seen as rude simply for failing to comply with normal practice, and for being selfish enough not to care if a boater following some time later finds a drained pound.

 

Think of it in the same way as it is normal practice to wear clothes in public even on a hot day. There's no particular reason for it, but to not comply with the convention leaves you open to accusations of rudeness.

Edited August 30, 2015 by nicknorman

[patty-ann]

We've just had wonderful trip up and down Braunstone locks..both times with lovely people helping and boats in the other locks all left gates if they saw us..twas boating at its best..I only once almost misjudged driving as I was busy trying to count exactly how many were on this hire boat + their crew that passed us...i lost count at 12 when I realised bow of my boat not behaving as it should!

[Bettie Boo]

No, you misconstrue. It is all very well saying locks shouldn't leak, but it is also true that there shouldn't be world poverty, war, violence etc. a nice idea but totally detached from reality. This is why gates and paddles should be closed on exit (except on rivers), as per CRT's boaters handbook etc. When that is normal practice as it is, those not complying are seen as rude simply for failing to comply with normal practice, and for being selfish enough not to care if a boater following some time later finds a drained pound.

 

Think of it in the same way as it is normal practice to wear clothes in public even on a hot day. There's no particular reason for it, but to not comply with the convention leaves you open to accusations of rudeness.

 

^^ quite true IMO

 

and lets face it - thankfully we aren't living in the 40's or 50's (or before)

 

It's great that there are so many who either remember or know someone who came from the time of the "old working boats" and share how it all used to work and share their stories. But whether for better or worse, things move on and times have changed. But lets be real, if we were to go back to doing things the way they were designed to be done when the canals were designed, we'd all have bales of hay on our roof's not solar panel's and bags of coal. And you'd be cruising in what was no better than an open sewer by now.

 

I can see why it would be beneficial to the actual working boats; fuel, pump out & trading boats to leave gates open, after all they are providing a service to the rest of us and quite often need to keep to a schedule. But with that said I've never noticed, in my limited experience, an actual working boat leave a gate open.

 

As for the rest of us; aren't we all simply leisure boaters of one form or another? whether we be live aboards or not, ccer's or home moorers, hireerers or own a share and therefore IMO be doing the best we can to conduct ourselves as much as possible to the ethos of the current boater's handbook.

[Tony Dunkley]

As I said earlier, in the 1970's when BWB started asking pleasure craft to close gates and paddles when leaving a lock, it was thought quite rightly that with both sets of gates and paddles closed the odds were better of having at least one end of the lock holding water in the event of it not being noticed that a paddle had not gone fully down or a sill was fouled, causing the gate to leak.

A better approach would have been to instruct those in charge of pleasure boats to check, just before the lock levelled off, that the gates and paddles behind them were not leaking. If they were leaking and the leak was due to anything other than the fixable problem of a paddle not having fully dropped, then close up everything at the other end as you leave the lock.

If there is no significant leakage behind the boat when the lock has nearly levelled off, then closing up the gates you're leaving the lock through isn't going to save any water whatsoever. To do as a matter of routine is a pointless waste of time and effort.

[nicknorman]

As I said earlier, in the 1970's when BWB started asking pleasure craft to close gates and paddles when leaving a lock, it was thought quite rightly that with both sets of gates and paddles closed the odds were better of having at least one end of the lock holding water in the event of it not being noticed that a paddle had not gone fully down or a sill was fouled, causing the gate to leak.

A better approach would have been to instruct those in charge of pleasure boats to check, just before the lock levelled off, that the gates and paddles behind them were not leaking. If they were leaking and the leak was due to anything other than the fixable problem of a paddle not having fully dropped, then close up everything at the other end as you leave the lock.

If there is no significant leakage behind the boat when the lock has nearly levelled off, then closing up the gates you're leaving the lock through isn't going to save any water whatsoever. To do as a matter of routine is a pointless waste of time and effort.

Unfortunately your approach would require common sense and good judgement ... Need I say more?

[StephenA]

If there is no significant leakage behind the boat when the lock has nearly levelled off, then closing up the gates you're leaving the lock through isn't going to save any water whatsoever. To do as a matter of routine is a pointless waste of time and effort.

 

Yes but given that a lot of boaters seem to be incapable of using any common sense at all a blanket "always close the gates" is a much easier message to drum into their heads.

[Tony Dunkley]

 

^^ quite true IMO

 

and lets face it - thankfully we aren't living in the 40's or 50's (or before)

 

It's great that there are so many who either remember or know someone who came from the time of the "old working boats" and share how it all used to work and share their stories. But whether for better or worse, things move on and times have changed. But lets be real, if we were to go back to doing things the way they were designed to be done when the canals were designed, we'd all have bales of hay on our roof's not solar panel's and bags of coal. And you'd be cruising in what was no better than an open sewer by now.

 

I can see why it would be beneficial to the actual working boats; fuel, pump out & trading boats to leave gates open, after all they are providing a service to the rest of us and quite often need to keep to a schedule. But with that said I've never noticed, in my limited experience, an actual working boat leave a gate open.

 

As for the rest of us; aren't we all simply leisure boaters of one form or another? whether we be live aboards or not, ccer's or home moorers, hireerers or own a share and therefore IMO be doing the best we can to conduct ourselves as much as possible to the ethos of the current boater's handbook.

 

The last long distance commercial narrowboat carrying from the Midlands coalfields to the paper mills and factories in the north London area didn't finish until 1970 and was soon followed, coincidental with the subsequent growth of pleasure boating, by the need for BWB to try and reduce water wastage caused by the inattentive and sloppy use of locks by pleasure boaters.

Times certainly have changed, and not for the better with regard to the way locks are worked and left. The fact that nobody needs to be in a hurry these days need not preclude the use of well proven practices and methods when working locks.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Tony Dunkley

[Tony Dunkley]

Unfortunately your approach would require common sense and good judgement ... Need I say more?

 

 

Yes but given that a lot of boaters seem to be incapable of using any common sense at all a blanket "always close the gates" is a much easier message to drum into their heads.

 

You're both quite right, of course, but there is no good reason for those with sufficient nouse to act sensibly based on what they can see happening in front of them, to have to fart about with procedures intended to reduce the impact of the terminally stupid.

Edited August 30, 2015 by Tony Dunkley

[BruceinSanity]

^^ quite true IMO

 

and lets face it - thankfully we aren't living in the 40's or 50's (or before)

 

It's great that there are so many who either remember or know someone who came from the time of the "old working boats" and share how it all used to work and share their stories. But whether for better or worse, things move on and times have changed. But lets be real, if we were to go back to doing things the way they were designed to be done when the canals were designed, we'd all have bales of hay on our roof's not solar panel's and bags of coal. And you'd be cruising in what was no better than an open sewer by now.

 

I can see why it would be beneficial to the actual working boats; fuel, pump out & trading boats to leave gates open, after all they are providing a service to the rest of us and quite often need to keep to a schedule. But with that said I've never noticed, in my limited experience, an actual working boat leave a gate open.

 

As for the rest of us; aren't we all simply leisure boaters of one form or another? whether we be live aboards or not, ccer's or home moorers, hireerers or own a share and therefore IMO be doing the best we can to conduct ourselves as much as possible to the ethos of the current boater's handbook.

 

Greenie for that, my thoughts exactly on reading this thread.

[johnmck]

^^ quite true IMO

 

and lets face it - thankfully we aren't living in the 40's or 50's (or before)

 

It's great that there are so many who either remember or know someone who came from the time of the "old working boats" and share how it all used to work and share their stories. But whether for better or worse, things move on and times have changed. But lets be real, if we were to go back to doing things the way they were designed to be done when the canals were designed, we'd all have bales of hay on our roof's not solar panel's and bags of coal. And you'd be cruising in what was no better than an open sewer by now.

 

 

I can see why it would be beneficial to the actual working boats; fuel, pump out & trading boats to leave gates open, after all they are providing a service to the rest of us and quite often need to keep to a schedule. But with that said I've never noticed, in my limited experience, an actual working boat leave a gate open.

 

As for the rest of us; aren't we all simply leisure boaters of one form or another? whether we be live aboards or not, ccer's or home moorers, hireerers or own a share and therefore IMO be doing the best we can to conduct ourselves as much as possible to the ethos of the current boater's handbook.

 

Very well said. Another Greenie.