Canal & River Trust sets out plans to review boat licensing

[Captain Pegg]

23 minutes ago, F DRAYKE said:

Now here’s a thought all wide canals should be for widebeams and all narrow canals for narrow boats.

 

Absolutely. It's obvious.

Narrow canals, narrow boats, narrow minds...

A great strap line for the Midlands.

JP

[Drayke]

2 minutes ago, dmr said:

And 57 foot boats should not be allowed on canals built for 70 foot boats ???????    and cars should not be allowed on roads capable of taking a 38 tonne truck, where will it all end?

................Dave

Best they leave things as they are then.

[rowland al]

I think it would be much better for all boaters if we stopped trying to polarise eachother. I rarely see it out on the cut. Why here?

[alan_fincher]

21 hours ago, Detling said:

They should apply the 25% discount to everyone who has to pay an 'end of garden' or NAA fee in their mooring charges, as we are subsidising the CCe'r and we use less facilities. We are effectively paying two fees to CART.  I choose to have a mooring so do pay but it is one more reason for a review. Many marina's won't take widebeams so if they have to pay more they could become like large diesel vehicles, not welcome in this century.

 

Tin hat time maybe.

 

 

You are not comparing like with like. are you?

Your EOG of NAA fee provides you with something a CC-er does not get, namely the right to leave your boat permanently moored at a fixed location of your choice.

If you are happy instead to move it around every 14 days to various tow-path locations, complying with "bona fide for navigation" then it is your right to do so, and you can cease paying the EOG or NAA charge.

I suggest you don't want to do that, which is why you choose to pay separately for something a CC-er doesn't get.

Also define "using less facilities" - there is surely no one size fits all answer on this, irrespective of whether you have a home mooring or not.  I have permanent moorings for both boats.  Some of the people on those moorings never appear to move those boats, others are out using them all the time.  Would you give a discount to the former, but not allow it to the latter.  If so, how would you police what is effectively a surcharge for the more you use your boat, the more you pay?

[Alan de Enfield]

10 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

Would you give a discount to the former, but not allow it to the latter.  If so, how would you police what is effectively a surcharge for the more you use your boat, the more you pay?

The technology is there - the 'will' to implement it is not, and, boaters are certainly not supportive of its use..

 

[Jerra]

22 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

The technology is there - the 'will' to implement it is not, and, boaters are certainly not supportive of its use..

 

I would totally agree.   The howls of anguish which can be heard when ever some form of technological tracker is mentioned prove the point.

[dmr]

22 hours ago, Detling said:

They should apply the 25% discount to everyone who has to pay an 'end of garden' or NAA fee in their mooring charges, as we are subsidising the CCe'r and we use less facilities. We are effectively paying two fees to CART.  I choose to have a mooring so do pay but it is one more reason for a review. Many marina's won't take widebeams so if they have to pay more they could become like large diesel vehicles, not welcome in this century.

 

Tin hat time maybe.

 

I know some leisure boaters feel that they are subsidising CC'ers but I don't think its that clear cut.

I personally think there is a case for CCers to pay a bit more but there are some very good arguments against it. CC'ers certainly do use more tap water and put more rubbish in the bins, but do this gently and predictably over the year. Leisure boaters mostly all come out for July and August, and the Easter holiday, and so put a huge strain on both the facilities and water resources meaning that large reservoirs have to be maintained to cope with this peak. Leisure boaters also expect the canalside shops and pubs to be ready and waiting but don't support them through the depths of winter.  

End of garden moorings just get in the way in some places .

..............Dave

[Arthur Marshall]

1 hour ago, Jerra said:

I would totally agree.   The howls of anguish which can be heard when ever some form of technological tracker is mentioned prove the point.

Mostly because technology doesn't work.   GPS is patchy anyway - and you'd have to weld it to the boat to stop someone unhitching it, riding a bike twenty miles and coming back to the same spot. Dishonest people don't suddenly get forced into compliance by technology - they just find a way round it. Meanwhile you add costs and penalise all the honest folk out there - the Boat Safety scheme is an obvious example of expensive pointlessness.

[Jerra]

15 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

Mostly because technology doesn't work.   GPS is patchy anyway - and you'd have to weld it to the boat to stop someone unhitching it, riding a bike twenty miles and coming back to the same spot. Dishonest people don't suddenly get forced into compliance by technology - they just find a way round it. Meanwhile you add costs and penalise all the honest folk out there - the Boat Safety scheme is an obvious example of expensive pointlessness.

GPS patchy?   Strange my sat nav never loses all 9 of the satellites at any one time.    It doesn't have to be GPS perhaps an RFID in the licence with hidden readers along the canal so that the bike ride wouldn't pass close enough and even if it did the time of passing would be wrong for the speed of a narrowboat.  If somebody was going to travel along the canal on a bike at 3 mph they may as well have taken the boat.

I am not particularly technical but I am not convinced that there isn't a reasonable technical solution which could be made fraud free. 

[Arthur Marshall]

I still think you're looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't really exist. Compared to the number of complying boaters, the number of the CMs are pretty low and most of CRT's actions in getting rid of them don't end up costing a lot, just one or two high profile ones. Problems in specific areas should have solutions tailored to those areas. 

[rowland al]

2 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

I still think you're looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't really exist. Compared to the number of complying boaters, the number of the CMs are pretty low and most of CRT's actions in getting rid of them don't end up costing a lot, just one or two high profile ones. Problems in specific areas should have solutions tailored to those areas. 

Couldn't agree more. Some people seem to like the big brother approach though!

[dmr]

1 minute ago, Arthur Marshall said:

I still think you're looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't really exist. Compared to the number of complying boaters, the number of the CMs are pretty low and most of CRT's actions in getting rid of them don't end up costing a lot, just one or two high profile ones. Problems in specific areas should have solutions tailored to those areas. 

The forum does keep returning to this topic and I agree with you!

GPS is not needed. CaRT do a reasonable amount of checking, and a human on the ground is much much better than remote monitoring, and so they already know where the CM'ers are. The problem is that it is legally, and sometimes morally, very time consuming and expensive to deal with them.

More importantly people come to the canals, for holidays, leisure, and living to get away from all the stress, rules and regulations of everyday life on the land so over regulation on the canals will be babies and bathwater.

................Dave

[Jerra]

28 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

I still think you're looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't really exist. Compared to the number of complying boaters, the number of the CMs are pretty low and most of CRT's actions in getting rid of them don't end up costing a lot, just one or two high profile ones. Problems in specific areas should have solutions tailored to those areas. 

I was thinking more along the lines of paying for the amount you use the canals as suggested earlier in the thread.   You appear to have jumped to the wrong conclusion.

[rowland al]

2 hours ago, Jerra said:

I was thinking more along the lines of paying for the amount you use the canals as suggested earlier in the thread.   You appear to have jumped to the wrong conclusion.

Fortunately not everything in life is about money and technology.

I'm pretty sure the C&RT management know how much their latest little venture will help divide boaters. Just in the same way Brexit did with the general population.

I just hope everyone can see though it.

[Gwydion]

On 04/04/2017 at 08:58, rowland al said:

I think it would be much better for all boaters if we stopped trying to polarise eachother. I rarely see it out on the cut. Why here?

Because it's harder for an offended person to punch you through a computer screen.

[rowland al]

3 minutes ago, Gwydion said:

Because it's harder for an offended person to punch you through a computer screen.

So very true! But I do think there is something about being on the cut which brings the best out of us. 

[Jess--]

On 04/04/2017 at 12:18, Jerra said:

GPS patchy?   Strange my sat nav never loses all 9 of the satellites at any one time.    It doesn't have to be GPS perhaps an RFID in the licence with hidden readers along the canal so that the bike ride wouldn't pass close enough and even if it did the time of passing would be wrong for the speed of a narrowboat.  If somebody was going to travel along the canal on a bike at 3 mph they may as well have taken the boat.

I am not particularly technical but I am not convinced that there isn't a reasonable technical solution which could be made fraud free. 

GPS may be available whenever the sky is visible but a method of sending that information on to someone else (CRT) is not (since that would have to use GSM signals).

Also given access to any CRT provided tracker I could probably have it informing them that my boat was halfway across the Atlantic within 30 minutes (bonus points if their system accepts that I'm exceeding the speed of sound)

[peterboat]

For the IWA this is all about the London problem they have backed CRT and I have cancelled my membership! The RBOA have listened to my complaint and are printing it because they want to know what the members want. Now we will have our chance but we have to let the various organisations know what we want otherwise you get what they want these arnt always compatable  to happiness on the cut.

So lobby complain and generally make life difficult for CRT because I can assure you it will always cost us all more when they change things

[alan_fincher]

As I understand it the RBOA's response to the licence consultation encourages the use of "tracker chips".

This is from their published press release.

Quote

Hard copy licences be issued to all craft, each licence containing an identifiable “tracker chip”. Non-display and/or tampering with the “chip” to be clearly defined as a material breach of licence conditions.

When I asked the RBOA chair whether reliable technology exists to actually track from something physically embedded in a licence disks, he didn't actually know the answer, but clearly such a device would need to be very small and also unpowered.

Can anybody please point me at a link that establishes this to be a genuinely available solution.

[Señor Chris]

16 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

Can anybody please point me at a link that establishes this to be a genuinely available solution.

Sounds like the timing transponders used in cycling and running events.

[Jerra]

31 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

As I understand it the RBOA's response to the licence consultation encourages the use of "tracker chips".

This is from their published press release.

When I asked the RBOA chair whether reliable technology exists to actually track from something physically embedded in a licence disks, he didn't actually know the answer, but clearly such a device would need to be very small and also unpowered.

Can anybody please point me at a link that establishes this to be a genuinely available solution.

Doesn't an RFID work like that getting its power from the reader?

Assuming I am right an RFID in the licence could be read from outside the boat either by a fixed reader somewhere or a passing "checking person".

[Robbo]

10 minutes ago, Jerra said:

Doesn't an RFID work like that getting its power from the reader?

Assuming I am right an RFID in the licence could be read from outside the boat either by a fixed reader somewhere or a passing "checking person".

Yes contactless credit cards work like this as do many door access systems for businesses.

[alan_fincher]

2 hours ago, Jerra said:

Doesn't an RFID work like that getting its power from the reader?

Assuming I am right an RFID in the licence could be read from outside the boat either by a fixed reader somewhere or a passing "checking person".

 

1 hour ago, Robbo said:

Yes contactless credit cards work like this as do many door access systems for businesses.

 

But the examples given assumes a reader no more than a few centimeters from the chip?

What the rest of the RBOA statement on this said, (and I only omitted it because it didn't until now seem relevant), is....

Quote

This would reduce the need and cost of CRT hands on data checking and, most importantly, would aid location of boats/boaters in cases of emergency – e.g. health and/or safety incident)

Something that required data checkers to run a scanner over your licence would NOT reduce the need or (significantly) the cost of CRT "hands on data checking.

And even if the chips could be recorded by canal side readers at some locations (could they?), would it help any more with locating the boat in an emergency.

From the discussion I was involved in I think RBOA think a system could use real time tracking, and say where my boat is now - not just where it might have happened to be maybe 2 or more weeks ago.

So is it practical to do real time tracking of an unpowered chip embedded in a licence?  I know what my guess is, but am I wrong?

 

Edited April 5, 2017 by alan_fincher

[rowland al]

On 04/04/2017 at 09:29, Alan de Enfield said:

The technology is there - the 'will' to implement it is not, and, boaters are certainly not supportive of its use..

 

So would you be happy to have to have a tracker fitted to your boat (assuming you have a boat)? 

Maybe it would be useful in the event of a boat being stolen but other than that there is no point. After all, there is no legal requirement to travel a certain distance. So what can CRT legally do with the data?

Maybe CRT could subject every boater to a lie detector test to find out wheter they REALLY intend to be on a  bona fide journey...lol.

[Robbo]

1 minute ago, alan_fincher said:

 

 

But the examples given assumes a reader no more than a few centimeters from the chip?

What the rest of the RBOA statement on this said, (and I only omitted it because it didn't until now seem relevant), is....

Something that required data checkers to run a scanner over your licence would NOT reduce the need or (significantly) the cost of CRT "hands on data checking.

And even if the chips could be recorded by canal side readers at some locations (could they?), would it help any more with locating the boat in an emergency.

From the discussion I was involved in I think RBOA think a system could use real time tracking, and say where my boat is now - not just where it might have happened to be recorded 6 weeks ago.

So is it practical to do real time tracking of an unpowered chip embedded in a licence?  I know what my guess is, but am I wrong?

 

I agee, it only makes the inputting of the boat details automatic (and should be more accurate?).  The RFID technology can be from a few meters.  The examples I gave don't do that for obvious reasons.