Where has all the unthusiam gone, is the heart of preservation now dead?

[Athy]

So it's the fault of people living on boats in London that these boats arent getting preserved?

I think you'll find people where cutting buttys up to make motors along time before living on a boat became an issue.

 

Regards kris

Er, not quite: they were surely cut up AFTER people had been living on them.

I'm sure a continuous moorer would be able to use the lack of an engine as an excuse to never move.

Tom

More of a reason than an excuse, I'd suggest, unless the boat owner has a horse. You raise an interesting point: do the regulations about moving ever 14 days apply to unpowered craft?

[kris88]

Er, not quite: they were surely cut up AFTER people had been living on them.

What I said is before it became an issue.i would have expected better from yourself.

 

Regards kris

[Athy]

What I said is before it became an issue.i would have expected better from yourself.

 

Regards kris

My answer was factual as far as I am aware. I am not sure what you would have expected which was "better": fiction?

It is not clear what you mean by "an issue". Perhaps you would explain.

[kris88]

I find it amazing that a certain sub set of boaters get the blame for all the of ills, that beset the waterways. Looked at in another light this influx of new blood to the waterways are the next generation of enthusiasts.

 

Regards kris

[Athy]

I find it amazing that a certain sub set of boaters get the blame for all the of ills, that beset the waterways. Looked at in another light this influx of new blood to the waterways are the next generation of enthusiasts.

 

Regards kris

Perhaps so, though I feel that you are exaggerating; but you have not explained what you mean by "an issue", nor why living aboard should be one.

[kris88]

I'm alright thanks, I'm shure you can figure it out a thy, I've got lots todo today.

 

Regards kris

[Athy]

I'm alright thanks, I'm shure you can figure it out a thy, I've got lots todo today.

 

Regards kris

Evidently you have no time to make a comprehensible post, or to have the courtesy to explain your previous mysterious ones. You appear to be looking for some sort of fight, well I am sorry but you'll have to look elsewhere. I'm not interested.

Now, in what sense do you use the word "issue"?

[Alan de Enfield]

Er, not quite: they were surely cut up AFTER people had been living on them.

More of a reason than an excuse, I'd suggest, unless the boat owner has a horse. You raise an interesting point: do the regulations about moving ever 14 days apply to unpowered craft?

 

I reckon that even in my current state (falling apart) I could bow-haul a boat 15 miles a year, maybe even a mile every 14 days.

[Guest User]

Gentlemen, could you remain (more-or-less) on-topic please?

Edited April 23, 2016 by Lady Cassandra

[kris88]

As your the one who is being pedantic, I'd suggest your the one looking for a fight.

I haven't got time, so I'll see you later.

[Captain Pegg]

Evidently you have no time to make a comprehensible post, or to have the courtesy to explain your previous mysterious ones. You appear to be looking for some sort of fight, well I am sorry but you'll have to look elsewhere. I'm not interested.

Now, in what sense do you use the word "issue"?

 

The point Kris made was clear to me and I happen to agree the post he responded to had little relevance to the issue at hand. And it's you that wants to prolong the discussion.

 

JP

[twbm]

It is absolutely the case that there are different attitude to the canals these days. In the 70's it was definitely about getting through no matter what, keeping the canals alive and, as has been said I think, there were times when stunts involving half missing lock gates, plywood and tarpaulins were pulled off that probably wouldn't be got away with now... a brick on a cill closes the canal now, it used to just mean someone either got lucky with a keb or went for a cold wade with a rope around their waist.

 

Nowadays to some degree there seems to be a sense of entitlement: it's a public asset so I can moor where I like for as long as I like and live how I like being one unfortunate manifestation. That's not the root of all the evils, funding will always be the be the real problem.

 

Meanwhile, Kriss has always got time to start a spat but then plays the 'can't be bovvered' card.

Edited April 23, 2016 by twbm

[alan_fincher]

You raise an interesting point: do the regulations about moving ever 14 days apply to unpowered craft?

 

Yes, of course they do.

[alan_fincher]

It is absolutely the case that there are different attitude to the canals these days. In the 70's it was definitely about getting through no matter what, keeping the canals alive and, as has been said I think, there were times when stunts involving half missing lock gates, plywood and tarpaulins were pulled off that probably wouldn't be got away with now... a brick on a cill closes the canal now, it used to just mean someone either got lucky with a keb or went for a cold wade with a rope around their waist.

 

Yes, all of this is true, but I don't think it is just red tape and a general lack of enthusiasts with enough spirit that makes it unlikely that boats deliberately sunk about half a century ago will get raised and fully restored.

 

In the era you talk about you could acquire a fully usable boat for less than £100, and most of the things necessary to forge a passage through the less navigable bits of the system could be found with no great expense.

 

Now, even if you succeed in raising the wreck of (say) an FMC iron butty, what you will then have is an FMC iron butty in far worse condition than buttys that already struggle to find a good home, and to turn it into something decent will undoubtedly cost tens of thousands of pounds. Even if you succeed, the chances are that another butty will at the same time be sat on a slipway somewhere, being cut in half to form two motors........ If you do produce a nicely restored butty, what do you do with it then? Put it outside a museum to slowly rot away again, as has happened to several previously?

 

It is a lovely aspiration to try and save everything that might be saved, but here I suspect we are talking about trying to save things that will realistically never be fully saved.

 

Saying this does not stop me being an enthusiast, (you need to be to privately own two 1936 ex working boats!), but it does perhaps place me more in the realm of realist.

[Athy]

As your the one who is being pedantic, I'd suggest your the one looking for a fight.

I haven't got time, so I'll see you later.

Pedantic? Certainly not. I asked you to explain your use of the word "issue", which you seem reluctant, or perhaps unable, to do..

Your suggestion is erroneous.

[kris88]

I know very little about the GU wide boats, only what has been posted on here about "progress" where they all wooden? How many where there?

 

Regards kris

[Athy]

 

Yes, all of this is true, but I don't think it is just red tape and a general lack of enthusiasts with enough spirit that makes it unlikely that boats deliberately sunk about half a century ago will get raised and fully restored.

 

In the era you talk about you could acquire a fully usable boat for less than £100, and most of the things necessary to forge a passage through the less navigable bits of the system could be found with no great expense.

 

Now, even if you succeed in raising the wreck of (say) an FMC iron butty, what you will then have is an FMC iron butty in far worse condition than buttys that already struggle to find a good home, and to turn it into something decent will undoubtedly cost tens of thousands of pounds. Even if you succeed, the chances are that another butty will at the same time be sat on a slipway somewhere, being cut in half to form two motors........ If you do produce a nicely restored butty, what do you do with it then? Put it outside a museum to slowly rot away again, as has happened to several previously?

 

It is a lovely aspiration to try and save everything that might be saved, but here I suspect we are talking about trying to save things that will realistically never be fully saved.

 

Saying this does not stop me being an enthusiast, (you need to be to privately own two 1936 ex working boats!), but it does perhaps place me more in the realm of realist.

Sad reading, but in the sense that it's probably true.

There is perhaps a case for trying to save/preserve/restore one of the wide boats, of which (if I have understood earlier posts correctly) none survives in working condition. From memory, the others have been inspected, photographed and (in most cases) identified for posterity, and that must suffice.

 

Yes, of course they do.

Thank you. I didn't know that. It is pleasant indeed to get a straight answer to a straight question.

[Athy]

I'm not sure if this has been asked (and answered) before, but does anyone know the identity and status of the sunken wooden working boat which lies in a very short arm just above Cropredy? It's beside where Justice, owned by a waterways journalist, used to moor, and I think that a boat called Spark is alongside it now. Is it abandoned, or intentionally sunk to preserve the wood pending restoration?

[David Mack]

I'm not sure if this has been asked (and answered) before, but does anyone know the identity and status of the sunken wooden working boat which lies in a very short arm just above Cropredy? It's beside where Justice, owned by a waterways journalist, used to moor, and I think that a boat called Spark is alongside it now. Is it abandoned, or intentionally sunk to preserve the wood pending restoration?

I think that is Langho. Its been discussed and pictured on here before. (On the phone so can't search for previous thread).

[MtB]

Thank you. I didn't know that. It is pleasant indeed to get a straight answer to a straight question.

 

Just to expand on this, if a butty owner applies for a 'cc licence' they will have declared on the form they will be using the boat bona fide for navigation throughout the period of the licence (etc), and CRT will have been satisfied by this declaration so they are obliged to move the butty every 14 days just like a powered boart CCer.

 

 

Edit to add:

 

A mod has just PMed me pointing out this takes the thread off topic. So just to expand even further, I posted this as a direct reply to Mr Athy only, who tends not to follow the CCer/CMer debate and appeared not to realise what applying for a CC licence involves. I did NOT to re-ignite the CCer/CMer debate so please, no further comments on this. Thank you.

Edited April 23, 2016 by Mike the Boilerman

[Athy]

I think that is Langho. Its been discussed and pictured on here before. (On the phone so can't search for previous thread).

Yes, found the old thread via Google, thanks. I looked on the Hysteric Boats web site but there was only an oblique reference to Langho, as the former butty of Lancing.

As she was also mentioned in that thread, does anyone know the current state of health of Hesperus, which spent some time at Welsh Richard's slipway being refurbished?

Edited April 23, 2016 by Athy

[MtB]

Yes, found the old thread via Google, thanks. I looked on the Hysteric Boats web site but there was only an oblique reference to Langho, as the former butty of Lancing.

As she was also mentioned in that thread, does anyone know the current state of health of Hesperus, which spent some time at Welsh Richard's slipway being refurbished?

 

 

Yes. Hesperus is back in the water and floating happily. Still a lot of work topside needed when I passed her back in about October though.

[bag 'o' bones]

 

snippity snip......

 

Even if you succeed, the chances are that another butty will at the same time be sat on a slipway somewhere, being cut in half to form two motors........ If you do produce a nicely restored butty, what do you do with it then? Put it outside a museum to slowly rot away again, as has happened to several previously?

 

It is a lovely aspiration to try and save everything that might be saved, but here I suspect we are talking about trying to save things that will realistically never be fully saved.

 

Saying this does not stop me being an enthusiast, (you need to be to privately own two 1936 ex working boats!), but it does perhaps place me more in the realm of realist.

 

I'm all for preserving canal craft as built, but if the only economic and practical way of preserving a buttys future is convert into two motors then surely that is preferable to scrappage. In any case the conversion of boats, building cars whatever has going on for years. They call it 'phasing' in archaeological circles.

 

Converting an historical craft into something else should not be seen as sacrilege but moreover just another 'phase' in the objects life.

 

For a boat to be preserved 'as is' it must adequately satisfy three values:

 

Historical value.

Monetary value

Social value.

 

I'll leave it there for a moment for folk to mull over

Edited April 23, 2016 by bag 'o' bones

[LeeW]

I think it's a terrible shame about Harefield. Like Junior I've read the original thread a few times before but as has been mentioned there are buttys being chopped all the time so perhaps the boats in Harefield might be safest where they are.

 

Perhaps an alternative would be to look at something smaller, simply getting some interpretation etc in place and get the wider public interested/aware. After that funding would be easier and hopefully the interest of the council would also be piqued too.

 

On a different note I hope the Facebook thread Alan Fincher mentioned is not referring to sticking a motor in Alperton though I suspect it is.

Edited April 23, 2016 by LeeW

[Athy]

Regarding Langho, I find that she was named after a Lancashire village which does not seem to be on a navigable waterway, but which has a railway station. This backs up the theory, advanced on here a little while ago, that the Town class boats were named after railway stations.

It would be a pity if she never floated again - but a post mentions that she has an owner, so she's not just been abandoned. What does this owner intend to do with her?