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A Message from Richard Parry to Boaters


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16 hours ago, Pluto said:

I have pointed out to Richard Parry that one important factor in why we have a waterway system today is that in the 1960s a number of waterway groups and individuals were prepared to stand up to a government which was looking to close down the whole system. Another reason was that they suddenly realised that they couldn't close the system without improving the land drainage provided by canals and navigations, the cost of which was more that the short-term cost of maintaining the system. Most politicians only look to the short term and like to have a nice quiet time, so the more people who write to them complaining, the more notice they take.

I agree that back in the 60s this was the case. If it hadn't been for the IWA and others back then we would not have the canal system we have today, bad as it is in places. The problem now is that all these groups, including the IWA, all have their own little agendas and seem to me to be working against each other. Until a coherent, collective, consenus of opinion prevails boating will be pushed further and further back down the agenda in my opinion. Reading this thread I get the impression that the diversity of opinion on the canals is reflected here. As has been said the reasons for rebranding have gone above a lot of boaters heads. I don't agree with some of it I will admit but, to an extent, it is neccessary. About getting more awareness of the canals that will only come with education. Open days, canal walks and school and young people organisation's presentation. I know a lot of you poo hoo the educational side of C&RT but it is an essential part of the fund raising scenario and the youngsters of today are the boaters, canal users and C&RT employees of the future. I am involved with the Canal and River Explorers, and in my opinion, this aspect of C&RT cannot be ignored by anybody.   

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14 minutes ago, Athy said:

Ha! That'll be accurate and meaningful, then.

I suggest the installation of turnstiles at every public entrance to a towpath, so that more exact figures may be garnered. This could be done for...ooh, £60k, could it not?

Three of the questions asked :

 

Q1 Firstly, I am going to read out some activities that you may have taken part in recently. For each one, can you tell me whether you personally have taken part in this activity in Britain within the past two weeks? So firstly, have you……[rotate activity list]…. on a stretch of inland water which is used by boats, for example a canal, river or lake.
1. Been on a boat with an engine
2. Been on a boat without an engine? Please
3. include activities such as canoeing, rowing boats and sailing boats
4. Been fishing
5. Been cycling
6. Walked a dog
7. Visited a specific attraction, heritage attraction or museum
8. Taken a walk or a ramble for leisure
9. Taken a run or jog for leisure
10. Used or walked along only in order to get somewhere else? For example, to get to work or to go shopping
11. Bought food or drink in a pub
12. Just sat or stood by the water as a break in the day to relax (always penultimate activity)
13. Used or visited for some other purpose? (SPECIFY)

Q2. [For each activity at Q1] On how many days in the past two weeks have you personally……[read out activity]….on a stretch of inland water used by boats, for example, a river, canal or lake in Britain?
WRITE IN NUMBER OF DAYS BETWEEN 1 AND 14.

Q3. [For each activity at Q1] And thinking about the last day you have……[read out activity]….which river, canal or lake did you do this on?
RECORD ALL OF THE FOLLOWING:
a) Name of Waterway (if known):
b) Nearest Town / Village:
c) Name of County:

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11 minutes ago, john6767 said:

Personally I would say that is never going to give any sort of valid answer.  Presumably they are dealing random land line numbers, so that only includes people with a landline that they answer calls on, which I would suggest is getting fewer and fewer, and massively skewed to a certain part of the population.  Or do they include mobile numbers, which again who answers a number they don’t recognise. Once they have got to the percentage who answer the phone to them, it is only a certain type of person that would give these people the time of day.  

 

So all told I really can see how that technique has any chance of giving valid results, but does that help or hinder CRT.

It neither helps nor hinders. The survey may overestimate the actual visitor numbers (I suspect it does) or underestimate them but will do so reasonably consistentLy. What is important is that they are taken as the measure of public benefit and C&RT is struggling to improve them.

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23 minutes ago, pete.i said:

As has been said the reasons for rebranding have gone above a lot of boaters heads. I don't agree with some of it I will admit but, to an extent, it is neccessary.

Please can you explain which bit of 'rebranding' was necessary.  The purpose of the exercise was to increase the brand awareness from 36% to 40%.  Brand awareness doesn't just mean matching a logo to an organisation, it means being able to tell someone else what that organisation stands for in terms of values and makes people wish to associate themselves with it.  If this wasn't happening to the extent,in percentage terms,  CRT had decided was important (and remember this is an arbitrary figure dreamed up because it is higher than the current figure) then what is needed is a huge advertising (or educational) campaign, not a new brand that means when asked (on day 1) only 1% will know what it stands for. 

 

In my view, which is not worth more than anyone else's, the prudent approach would have been to explain to 35,000 roving ambassadors (licensed boaters) what CRT were trying to do, enlist support, advertise in newspapers and on television, with the 60K and if that fails blame the swan and bridge and the font with serifs.  

 

Edited by Tanglewood
edited twice - once to correct a typo and then to remove a randomly inserted piece of text
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29 minutes ago, Athy said:

I thought this was a telephonic survey. Yet question 2 exhorts the interviewee to "write in" information. How bizarre.

The instructions in CAPITALS are to the interviewer (not the recipient) just in case they are 'monkeys being paid peanuts' and do not remember what to do.

Remember Corbyn's 'cheat sheet' at conference "strong message here" fiasco ?

 

 

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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25 minutes ago, Athy said:

I thought this was a telephonic survey. Yet question 2 exhorts the interviewee to "write in" information. How bizarre.

 

It's the crib sheet for the person conducting the telephone survey.

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30 minutes ago, Allan(nb Albert) said:

It neither helps nor hinders. The survey may overestimate the actual visitor numbers (I suspect it does) or underestimate them but will do so reasonably consistentLy. What is important is that they are taken as the measure of public benefit and C&RT is struggling to improve them.

Do they capture the demographics of the people who respond to the survey?  I can see if the demographics are a constant each time, that gives a relative measure of performance with that demographic, but does not really measure public benefit as a whole.

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8 minutes ago, john6767 said:

Do they capture the demographics of the people who respond to the survey?  I can see if the demographics are a constant each time, that gives a relative measure of performance with that demographic, but does not really measure public benefit as a whole.

I recently posted the criteria and demographics required - it was outlined in the new RFQ in the tender documents. I can no longer find it.

 

From memory one of the criteria was aged (something like) 30-60 yo.

 

I'll keep hunting and see what I can find.

 

The Canal & River Trust monitors both visitors (people) and visits (occasions) through our Inland Waterways Visitor Survey (IWVS). The IWVS was established in 2003 and is currently conducted by independent market research agency BDRC Continental. The IWVS is a telephone survey that runs continuously through the year, interviewing almost 12,000 people annually.

A nationally representative sample of just under 1,000 adults is interviewed each month. Data is weighted on a monthly basis to the national GB population profile in terms of region, sex and age. A Random Digit Dialling (RDD) approach is used. This is a system which offers a totally geographically unclustered sample; vital since an individual’s usage of waterways is determined in part by their proximity to waterways (either living or working).

The visitor figure referred to, of around 10 million is based on the number of people who say they have visited a canal in the last year. Some will only have visited once, perhaps to a canal side pub for Sunday lunch; others may be visiting everyday as their route to work or to walk the dog. We know asking about behaviour over the last year presents some problems – some people may think back beyond a year, others will have forgotten their visit. We feel however, that this measure gives us a reasonable overview of visitor behaviour on an annual basis.

We also measure total visit occasions, and although there is obviously varies from year to year, depending on the weather, external events as well as our own marketing and communications. It is usually around 300 million visits.

The total visits figure is gathered by first asking people if they have visited one of our waterways in the last two weeks. Why two weeks? Two weeks is used as it is short enough to accurately remember more detailed information about their visit, but gives a larger and more robust sample than just asking about visits in the last week. Some people may have only visited once; others may have visited lots, doing different activities on different occasions. By counting all these different occasions we can monitor the number of visits made each month and in total over the year.

 

And the outline tender documents :

 

England's Waterways Visitor Survey

Marketing Birmingham Ltd has announced on 08 Mar 2018 that is accepting bids for the following project: England's Waterways Visitor Survey.

The tender will take place in United Kingdom and will cover the Consumer Goods & Services industry.

The value of this project has not been disclosed by the donor and you can apply until Deadline date

After the deadline, Global Database will announce the contract award for England's Waterways Visitor Survey. In order to stay up-to-date with this tender and also to receive daily notifications about similar projects, you can subscribe to our newsletter for free.

 

The target markets are repeat visitors of 45-65 years of age, easy outdoor adventurers and mature experience seekers. This project is funded by Visit Britain / Visit England's 'Discover England' programme, which seeks to broaden the reach of international visitors to England through introduction to new markets and development of bookable, commissionable product. It is match funded by project partners.

Lot 1: Survey A survey of customers who purchase the packages marketed as part of the project (e.g. narrow boating, walking and cycling, wider year round activity such as cultural short breaks) is required.

Lot 2: Qualitative Research Further in-depth, qualitative research with a sub-set of survey participants is required to further understand their motivations to visit and to purchase, satisfaction with their experience, booking behaviour and reaction to media and marketing activity. We will require research to take place with a representative cross section of customers (i.e. by type of package purchased, source market, demographics). Again we are happy to consider different possible methodologies (i.e. depth interviews, focus groups).

Lot 3: Economic Impact Evaluation An evaluation of the economic impact of the England's Waterways Project is required. This should include direct impact and multiplier effects, and the numbers of jobs supported both directly and indirectly by the project.

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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Waterway Engagement Monitor (WEM)

Adaption of an existing tool

The Waterway Engagement Monitor (WEM), an online monthly survey, is the Trust’s primarily tool for measuring brand awareness, engagement, participation and people’s motivations for use of our waterways. This online monthly survey focuses on both use of the waterways such as volume of visitors to the waterways, frequency, activity type, visitor satisfaction, motivations and demographics as well as eliciting information of strategic importance to the Trust about the levels of brand awareness, appeal and advocacy within the wider population.

The Trust will use this tool to measure and evaluate some of the OMF indicators at a national level. This continuous survey (operational since 2004) is currently managed by BDRC Continental on behalf of the Trust. Between 2004 and April 2015 it was administered using a telephone methodology but moved in May 2015 to an online methodology with a sample drawn from online panels.

A nationally representative sample comprising 960 adults across England and Wales are interviewed each month, totally 11,500 adults over the year (and the sample is weighted to represent the England and Wales adult population. There is an even distribution of respondents throughout the month in order to smooth vagaries of weather and other extraneous factors. All survey respondents are adults aged 15 or over (although information is collected on ages of all household members including children and ages of all child participants in waterway activities). Data is weighted to the national GB population profile in terms of region, sex, social grade and age.

It will provide a national and regional benchmark against which local community surveys and towpath intercept surveys conducted within the Longitudinal Study Areas and project-specific evaluations can be compared.

WEM has been adapted to include the survey questions relating to:

 household demographics; long term illness, health problem, disability; ethnicity;

 alternative mode of sustainable transport; use as a location for physical exercise; awareness of and value of waterway to local area; and length of time lived in current neighbourhood; as well as

 the self-reported, attitudinal and perception indicators, linked to the six OMF domains.

Since April 2016, the Trust has included the four Office of National Statistics (ONS) four measures of subjective wellbeing. We intend to compare these results with the UK National Statistics for the same period when published by the ONS later this year.

 

The above was taken from https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/refresh/media/thumbnail/33802-canal-and-river-trust-outcomes-report-waterways-and-wellbeing-full-report.pdf 

What is interesting is that Section 8 of this report describes future plans

 

Our planned activity for next twelve months

Our activities during next twelve months will focus upon:

  • phase two of putting the measurement and evaluation infrastructure in place to support the outstanding OMF / outcome indicators;

  • collatingthestatisticalevidencetobeabletoreporton,andapplythevaluationmethodologiesto the different OMF domains and indicators for inclusion within our second Outcomes Report;

  • the first phase of retrospective project evaluation work, to help build the repository of evidential case studies, testimonies and examples for effective ‘storytelling’;

  • developingapropositionthatenablestheTrustto‘capture’theoutcomesgeneratedbyothers using our waterways as a platform (charities, clubs, social enterprises, etc); and

  • using our outcomes work to inform our public policy and public affairs work and our response to devolution as well as provide strategic direction on the Trust’s activities and interventions as part of the business plan preparation process.

There then follows 7 pages (of a 123 page report excluding appendices) and nowhere does it talk about this re-branding exercise  

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27 minutes ago, Tanglewood said:

There then follows 7 pages (of a 123 page report excluding appendices) and nowhere does it talk about this re-branding exercise

 

Which reinforces the view that an organisation whose board feels powerless to stop it heading into the quicksand, tends to stop firefighting and instead fiddles about doing stuff like changing its name or designing a new logo. 

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10 minutes ago, Sbg said:

Can anyone please provide a link to the Simetrica research?

I guess its easier to ask someone to do it for you than do it yourself.

 

Easily found on the C&RT website.

 

https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/media/original/38060-simetrica-report.pdf?v=6e3662

 

It does seem a little 'far-fetched to my simple mind.

 

The estimated value associated with visiting a waterway is broadly similar to the wellbeing value of engaging in other cultural activities. A weekly visit to the cinema is associated with a wellbeing value of £4 per visit and doing sport at least once a week produces an estimate of £10.54.13 As the wellbeing value per visit for doing these other activities is based on assumptions regarding the number of visits made annually (for that specific activity), direct comparisons of value per visit across wellbeing valuation studies should be made with caution. 

Breaking down the average value of £6.63 per visit by the level of waterways usage, we find that there is a larger wellbeing association per trip for the first additional 10 trips (£53.24 per trip), and a smaller value per additional trip for increases beyond that level (£2.93 per trip)14.  This pattern of positive but decreasing additional value per trip is aligned with the wider economic literature: a person is expected to receive less additional satisfaction from each additional waterway visit as they become accustomed to the environment with greater levels of usage (a phenomenon known as diminishing marginal returns). 

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Three of the questions asked :

 

Q1 Firstly, I am going to read out some activities that you may have taken part in recently. For each one, can you tell me whether you personally have taken part in this activity in Britain within the past two weeks? So firstly, have you……[rotate activity list]…. on a stretch of inland water which is used by boats, for example a canal, river or lake.
1. Been on a boat with an engine
2. Been on a boat without an engine? Please
3. include activities such as canoeing, rowing boats and sailing boats
4. Been fishing
5. Been cycling
6. Walked a dog
7. Visited a specific attraction, heritage attraction or museum
8. Taken a walk or a ramble for leisure
9. Taken a run or jog for leisure
10. Used or walked along only in order to get somewhere else? For example, to get to work or to go shopping
11. Bought food or drink in a pub
12. Just sat or stood by the water as a break in the day to relax (always penultimate activity)
13. Used or visited for some other purpose? (SPECIFY)

Q2. [For each activity at Q1] On how many days in the past two weeks have you personally……[read out activity]….on a stretch of inland water used by boats, for example, a river, canal or lake in Britain?
WRITE IN NUMBER OF DAYS BETWEEN 1 AND 14.

Q3. [For each activity at Q1] And thinking about the last day you have……[read out activity]….which river, canal or lake did you do this on?
RECORD ALL OF THE FOLLOWING:
a) Name of Waterway (if known):
b) Nearest Town / Village:
c) Name of County:

If they phoned me they’d have got half way through question 1 when I would have interrupted them and said “Sorry, I don’t have the time for this nonsense” and hung up. 

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1 minute ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I guess its easier to ask someone to do it for you than do it yourself.

 

Easily found on the C&RT website.

 

https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/media/original/38060-simetrica-report.pdf?v=6e3662

Thanks for providing the link but I don't appreciate the snide comment that accompanied it.  I'm reviewing some other research to support the FOI request I put to CRT so a little help was welcome at a time when I was quite busy.  

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Just now, Athy said:

When did British people stop "taking a dog for a walk" and start "walking a dog"? I blame Rufus Thomas.

We still take the dogs for a walk. But we’re a couple of old farts. 

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2 minutes ago, WotEver said:

We still take the dogs for a walk. But we’re a couple of old farts. 

"No it was the dog".

"Actually it was me".

- paraphrased from one of this year's funniest T.V. adverts (as usual, I have no recollection of the product it was advertising; prunes perhaps).

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1 minute ago, WotEver said:

If they phoned me they’d have got half way through question 1 when I would have interrupted them and said “Sorry, I don’t have the time for this nonsense” and hung up. 

They would not have got that far with me.  If I had answered the phone to an unknow number then as they introduce them selves and said the were doing marker research, they would not have finished the word research before I had put the phone down.  If is perhaps a shame, but you can not easily tell if this is a scammer or someone genuine, so just don't talk to them.  Quite who it is that would engage with them and give up this level of detail I don't know, but I would assert it is not a representable sample of the population.

 

But as I read it they have abandoned the phone approach. It says the online survey is based on members of a panel, but does not say how that panel is selected, but I think you have a better change to getting a representative sample doing it that way, than by a cold call. 

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2 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Three of the questions asked :

 

Q1 Firstly, I am going to read out some activities that you may have taken part in recently. For each one, can you tell me whether you personally have taken part in this activity in Britain within the past two weeks? So firstly, have you……[rotate activity list]…. on a stretch of inland water which is used by boats, for example a canal, river or lake.
1. Been on a boat with an engine
 

etc etc

At certain times, I guess even people who own a boat wouldn't necessarily be able to say they'd been on one in the previous two weeks.

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I own a boat. It has an engine. I walk in the tow path. I take dogs for a walk. I have cycled (not now though).i have visited places of interest. I don't run nor jog. You get it, am I 8 people or just a lucky so and so.

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CaRT have started using CCTV cameras to monitor certain areas for footfall, they are triangle V shaped, about 1ft high, black plastic with a sensor/camera eye towards the bottom. They have put one at Victoria Quays, Sheffield, which points at Victoria Quays Car park foot exit and Victoria Junction Café, which is opposite the Towpath side of the canal. So all that it is monitoring is mainly office workers going to and from work and how busy the café is at lunch time when said office workers have lunch and also people who have parked in the car park to walk into the city centre. I would say that only 10-20% of the people picked up by this camera actually walk/use the canal Towpath. So not really a true reflection of Towpath use.

Edited by PD1964
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4 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

CaRT have started using CCTV cameras to monitor certain areas for footfall, they are triangle shaped, about 1ft high, black plastic with a sensor/camera eye towards the bottom. They have put one at Victoria Quays, Sheffield, which points at Victoria Junction Café, which is opposite the Towpath side of the canal. So all that it is monitoring is mainly office workers going to and from work and how busy the café is at lunch time when said office workers have lunch. I would say that only 10-20% of the people picked up by this camera actually walk/use the canal Towpath.

That will be what this means then

 

  • phase two of putting the measurement and evaluation infrastructure in place to support the outstanding OMF / outcome indicators;

  1. Putting the infrastructure in place – towpath measurement

    We are in the process of a two phase installation of around 50 automatic video analytic sensors, to monitor the volume and type of towpath use in the fourteen longitudinal study areas (LSAs). In addition we are also installing temperature and air quality sensing capabilities in six of the more densely populated urban LSAs. Further sensors will be installed as part of future property development schemes and externally funded projects initiated and /or delivered by the Trust and its partners.

 

I'm thinking of becoming a 'friend' of the Campaign for Plain English, in the hope that they could make more difference to CRT than being a 'friend' of CRT can. 

Edited by Tanglewood
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