Lack of platforms at locks

[Horace42]

1 hour ago, alan_fincher said:

 

That seems a very odd view to me!

 

Unlike you, I spend perhaps the greater part of my time using broad rather than narrow locks.

 

OK, unusually this year, I don't think I have ever not shared one, but both boats in them have been my own, so the issue has not arisen.

 

However when sharing with a boat that is not mine, it is totally random whether I'm the first one in the lock or the second.  If I have just caught a boat up, I  have no idea of the skills or experience of the crew taking the boat in first.  I certainly would not assume they are "in charge" ot accept that I have to live with whatever they do as being at my own risk because I "chose" to enter the same lock.

 

It's not supposed to be a "choice! anyway is it?  You are requested to share locks whenever possible to minimise water use.

 

No I don't have an answer as to who is in overall charge.  If I am sharing with someone very cautious, I will go along with their cautiousness, and only start any objection if I see something that could be dangerous, (e.g. boat tied to bollard in emptying lock, boat over cill, tyre fenders using up lots of available width in lock).  If I find a like minded person who is keen to do it quickly and efficiently, (no over cautious paddle opening, for example), I'm happier, but I'll never force anybody to work fast unless that's their choice.

 

I suspect that  if I did follow you into a broad lock, we would actually get along fine, and work it efficiently and safely.  I would not however expect you to tell me what I could or or could not do simply because you went in first.  To be clear though, no paddle would get wound without your approval.

I would hope that the person starting this post always sought approval for his actions though.  Would he for example know that if we are working our two boats breasted together through a flight, (one 72 feet, one 40, and with back ends tied in line), paddles get opened in this order.

 

Uphill

 

Gate paddles on side of shorter boat

Ground paddleson side of shorter boat

Ground paddle on side of longer boat

Gate paddles on side of longer boat.

 

(Because this is how they get banged around least, and water is not going to flood front deck of longer boat)

 

Downhill

 

Paddle on side of longer boat

Paddle on side of shorter boat

 

(Because front of longer boat rests against bottom gate, and boats will drift back if paddle not drawn that side first)

 

I'll wager most people reading this, (boat owner or just keen helper), would not choose those orders, but experience tells us that is what works best and is safest.  That's why I would always prefer that people ask, when it is our two boats in the lock.

 

Note CRT volunteers regularly don't ask, and operate paddles in an order we would prefer they did not - part of the issue I have with this.  THe best ones say "how do you want to do it", and we tell them, and are grateful for their help.  No third party should intervene without asking, even if it is Richard Parry, (and we have been worked though locks by Richard).

 

I have been boating for years, and I didn't realise there was so much to sharing a lock.

I am not denying you need to know all this, but a novice being hit with this list might be put off.

The last time we went down the Hatton flight we were the only boat in sight - except for the two we were following - that was hard work.

 

[GuyBarry]

1 hour ago, mayalld said:

Which rather neatly shows that you don't actually understand the issue.

 

I wanted to know who you thought was in charge of the lock, but you talk about who owns it. You don't perceive that there is a difference between the two.

 

"In charge of" means "responsible for".  The C&RT are responsible for the lock.  The boater is in control  of the lock, not in charge of it.

 

I suggest you consult a dictionary before accusing me of not understanding things.

[furnessvale]

32 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

Well with two boats of highly dissimilar length if you tie the front ends in line, the back end of the shorter boat will be a long way forward from the back end of the longer one.  This rules out using the shorter boat as the tug, because if you try to steer towards the side the longer boat is on, the wash from the prop of the shorter boat is aimed at the side of the longer one, and much of your available propulsion and steering is lost.

 

Not so much of an issue now we have sorted the longer boat out enough to do the pulling, but certainly not viable for Sickle towing Flamingo.

 

However I also find it very much easier to get into double locks, if I only have to put 7 feet of width in in the first place.  I can afford to be not fully to the side, nor even dead straight in line with the lock as the first bow enters, and still have 30 feet of forward travel to ensure the second boat goes in as I want.

 

Finally, having both back ends tied together gives me the steerer a continuous route for easily crossing the back of both boats, so in a dull lock, I can easily cross to the side of the unpowered boat, if I need to operate gates or paddles on that side.

 

A no brainer really - I had not realised there were so many reasons why it is best!

 

Doing it the other way has no merits I can see at all in our case, and would lose all the benefits I have listed.

Interesting that my experience of breasting dissimilar length boats is quite different.

 

Whilst sterns together allows one bow to enter first, I have found the devil's own job in getting the first boat neatly alongside the lock, especially with wind or water flow, such that the second boat's bows can take a nasty clout from the wing wall before you are aligned.

 

For what it is worth, I always tie bows together  and steer from the longer boat so that both bows neatly enter together as if they were a wide beam.

 

George

[GuyBarry]

2 hours ago, mayalld said:

You have said various things about how you operate a lock, in terms of how fast you wind paddles and making sure that the boat is past the cill. These are all very sensible things that show that you are thinking about what you are doing to an extent, but you are missing the most important consideration, namely that (no matter how happy YOU are that the boat is properly placed in the lock to proceed, or that your speed of winding paddles is correct, it is NOT your view that matters, it is the view of the steerer (or whoever is supervising the steerer).

I have already said that I always wait for a signal from the steerer before winding the paddles.  I don't see how I can make that any clearer.

 

You seem determined to make me out as some sort of officious twerp who thinks he knows it all.  I most definitely am not.  I listen very carefully to what I'm told by experienced boaters and will always defer to them.  I've learned most of what I know now by observing skilful boaters - and also hopeless ones.  I've made mistakes but I've learned from them.  I like to think I'm getting better all the time.

 

As to whether I'm committing an offence, I admit I don't know the legal situation, but what makes me any different from an untrained crew member on a boat who gets out and helps with the lock?

[GuyBarry]

1 hour ago, dmr said:

Hand signals between the paddle winder and steerer are pretty much essential but very few boaters use them, I note that a few lock volunteers do.

 

If I don't get a signal from the steerer, I usually gesture to them and point my finger upwards to show that I'm ready to raise the paddle.  Until they acknowledge me, I don't do anything.  Sometimes, if there's a crew member working the other paddle, I'll communicate via them (since they know the steerer better than I do, and can usually hear what I'm saying).

[alan_fincher]

10 minutes ago, furnessvale said:

Interesting that my experience of breasting dissimilar length boats is quite different.

 

Whilst sterns together allows one bow to enter first, I have found the devil's own job in getting the first boat neatly alongside the lock, especially with wind or water flow, such that the second boat's bows can take a nasty clout from the wing wall before you are aligned.

 

For what it is worth, I always tie bows together  and steer from the longer boat so that both bows neatly enter together as if they were a wide beam.

 

George

Clearly experiences differ, which is interesting, as I have little doubt your overall experience exceeds my own.

 

All I can say is that what we now do works well for us, and getting both boats into a lock rarely results in the shorter boat hitting anything on that side.

 

I should also perhaps have said that the reason we have to do it as we do, is that we have special eyes welded to each gunwale of "Flamingo" that are the right distance along that when a rope is tied from Sickle's T stud to them, the backs then line up.  We would need extra eyes added in a quite different position if we were to have the fronts lined up!

What we proved very early on was that the whole think was impossible based on just the attachment points that each boat naturally had - any attempts to attach front and backs together with highly angled lines couldn't possibly work.  Pictures of "Sickle" before our ownership show it breasted with a full length butty, but only by wrapping ropes under cross planks and stretcher chains.  A mast might also offer an option, but as "Flamingo" has neither we quickly realised it needed some extra "loops" if tying both boats together was going to be a realistic way of working.

 

I've just thought of yet another reason why tying the fronts together in our case would be impractical.  All of "Sickle" would be forward of "Flamingo's" famous gap, so it would not be possible to get the dogs across "Sickles" deck, and in to the cabin on "Flamingo"!

How did you get on with using "Sandbach" as a tug, if breasted with a full length boat that could not be powered?  Even "Sickle", (quite a bit longer), tends to take both boats along far too "crap style" for it to be a lot of fun - hence why I now nearly always use "Flamingo" as the tug.

[mayalld]

2 hours ago, nicknorman said:

I think you are giving this guy an unduly hard time. He whole tone doesn't strike me as someone who would "take charge" and start doing stuff when the boaters didn't want them to. Conversely there have been plenty of times when official CRT volunteers have done just that, presumably their uniform and training giving them some sense of empowerment. Similarly if you ventured a little further from home you would encounter locks that are controlled by CRT employees and there is no doubt that they are in charge of operating the lock. Obviously one would hope that they take into account what the boaters want but in reality they do their thing, you like it or lump it. Severn locks, Thames locks, Bingley 5 rise, Bratch (sometimes, when there is a CRT employee on duty) and many others. So you are living in a bit of a fantasy land if you think you are always in control of the lock you are in. Well, unless you restrict yourself only to your home patch I suppose. How would you cope in the big bad real world?

I accept that where a lock is operated by a CRT employee, they are in charge, and I decide whether to proceed through that lock on that basis.

 

CRT volunteers and random people with a windlass are not in charge.

 

The issue that I have is that when somebody else wants to interfere at a lock, I have no way of knowing whether they will do the right thing or not (applies to vollies as well as random windlass wielders), and as I am perfectly capable of doing the lock myself, it is better that they don't interfere.

[Iain_S]

3 hours ago, mayalld said:

(snip)

 

When we did the Bunbury Shuffle last year, I was in charge because everybody agreed I would be!

 

 ... and you were probably the only one who knew how it went !

[mayalld]

58 minutes ago, GuyBarry said:

I have already said that I always wait for a signal from the steerer before winding the paddles.  I don't see how I can make that any clearer.

 

You seem determined to make me out as some sort of officious twerp who thinks he knows it all.  I most definitely am not.  I listen very carefully to what I'm told by experienced boaters and will always defer to them.  I've learned most of what I know now by observing skilful boaters - and also hopeless ones.  I've made mistakes but I've learned from them.  I like to think I'm getting better all the time.

 

As to whether I'm committing an offence, I admit I don't know the legal situation, but what makes me any different from an untrained crew member on a boat who gets out and helps with the lock?

 

I don't know whether you are good at it or not. I only have your own opinion of yourself to go on, and if I encounter you at a lock then do I want to risk problems by allowing somebody who may or may not know what to do to meddle?

 

You have learned some basics, because you have listened. Have you learned because you have actually been faced with a situation? How difficult was it when you were steering a boat and somebody whacked some paddles up? Your lack of boating experience means that you are following a set of rules because you know what they are, rather than understanding why they are through experience.

 

As to the legal situation; an untrained crew member has authority to operate a lock, because he or she is part of the crew of a boat, and CRT say that they can operate locks. You have no such authority, and you shouldn't touch them. It is unlikely that you would be prosecuted just for doing so, but if you cause an injury and the boater says "I didn't ask him to do anything, he just rocked up with a windlass", you could expect to be prosecuted.

 

Basically, it isn't actually about YOU, it is about anybody of unknown provenance interfering. In my experience, the vast majority of people who want to "help" me at a lock (whether boaters or the public at large) are actually of no help whatsoever, and the same can be said for a lot of vollies.

 

Good luck in learning and getting better. I hope that you will continue to learn by official means, but you will not be using my boat as a training exercise.

[john6767]

11 minutes ago, mayalld said:

I accept that where a lock is operated by a CRT employee, they are in charge, and I decide whether to proceed through that lock on that basis.

 

CRT volunteers and random people with a windlass are not in charge.

 

The issue that I have is that when somebody else wants to interfere at a lock, I have no way of knowing whether they will do the right thing or not (applies to vollies as well as random windlass wielders), and as I am perfectly capable of doing the lock myself, it is better that they don't interfere.

The trouble with that approach is you don’t know if the CRT person operating the lock is a employee or volunteer, I am thinking about big automated locks, eg Trent here, where you can’t see them.  You really don’t have any choice to accept they are in charge of the lock.

Edited July 5, 2018 by john6767

[mayalld]

5 minutes ago, Iain_S said:

 ... and you were probably the only one who knew how it went !

That's true!

 

The best bit was the bloke on the side who was confidently telling his wife that we'd made a right balls-up, because we had too many boats in the lock, and "doesn't that idiot know how to do staircase locks"

 

[GuyBarry]

5 minutes ago, mayalld said:

 

As to the legal situation; an untrained crew member has authority to operate a lock, because he or she is part of the crew of a boat, and CRT say that they can operate locks. You have no such authority, and you shouldn't touch them.

But who counts as "crew"?

 

I have an occasional arrangement with the owner of one of the trip boats that I set the lock for him.  He phones me a few minutes before he's due there, and I fill or empty it as required, in exchange for a small consideration.  Am I part of the "crew"?

 

Another example: on Monday someone picked me up at Weston Lock and took me to Bath Bottom Lock, where I helped him through the flight of six locks.  I then travelled a short distance with him before getting off the boat and walking back home.  Was I "crew" because I'd travelled on the boat?

[mayalld]

4 minutes ago, GuyBarry said:

But who counts as "crew"?

 

I have an occasional arrangement with the owner of one of the trip boats that I set the lock for him.  He phones me a few minutes before he's due there, and I fill or empty it as required, in exchange for a small consideration.  Am I part of the "crew"?

 

Another example: on Monday someone picked me up at Weston Lock and took me to Bath Bottom Lock, where I helped him through the flight of six locks.  I then travelled a short distance with him before getting off the boat and walking back home.  Was I "crew" because I'd travelled on the boat?

Yes, in those cases you are crew, because the person in charge of the boat has invited you to assist.

 

If you pitch up at a paddle, windlass in hand (or worse, windlass already on the spindle) and carry on unless the boater positively tells you to go away, you are not crew.

[GuyBarry]

Then in that case I have absolutely no compunction about continuing with what I'm doing.  As long as I explain to the boater that I'm not a trained volunteer, that I'm there to help if he or she wants, and always follow their instructions, I am effectively acting as part of the "crew" for the time that the boat is passing through the lock.

[RLWP]

There is a totally non-controversial way for you to help out. On a lock flight, go ahead and set the next lock(s) for a boat. You can't be endangering a boat as there won't be one there

 

And it's a very acceptable way of helping out and speeding a boat up a flight

 

Likewise, closing up after a boat leaves a lock is very much appreciated

 

Some of the best volunteer lockies we have come across (official or not) have been doing these things

 

Richard

[Graham Davis]

1 minute ago, GuyBarry said:

Then in that case I have absolutely no compunction about continuing with what I'm doing.  As long as I explain to the boater that I'm not a trained volunteer, that I'm there to help if he or she wants, and always follow their instructions, I am effectively acting as part of the "crew" for the time that the boat is passing through the lock.

I suspect that is debateable legally.

Why don't you just go down the offical CaRT Volunteering route,  and stop all the petty semantics on here about "ownership" (post #77)? Doing it that way you get the backing of CaRT if anything ever went wrong.

 

I've been boating on and off for 50 years and when I worked in and around Brum I would often park up lunchtimes near the canals and would help people through various locks, but the only thing I would do was to open and close gates, firstly because I didn't carry a windlass very often and secondly because opening paddles is one of the most dangerous areas of lock work and every boat wants it done differently.

And sorry, but from some of your responses here I would be telling you "No thanks!"

[Horace42]

19 minutes ago, Iain_S said:

 ... and you were probably the only one who knew how it went !

 

12 minutes ago, mayalld said:

That's true!

 

The best bit was the bloke on the side who was confidently telling his wife that we'd made a right balls-up, because we had too many boats in the lock, and "doesn't that idiot know how to do staircase locks"

 

I was a 'victim' of the Bunbury shuffle - not in it as such - but next but one down - and held up by the 'shuffle' - and the 'ignorance' of the boaters already in the lock not being aware of the 'complexity of the shuffle (including me - but I caught on quick)  - and lots of shouting (mainly for instructions to be heard rather than in annoyance) - but not helped by stubborn claims of 'right-of-way'.

 

It worked out alright in the end - but only with the 'authority' of an independent lockie.

[Mike Todd]

Too often folk concentrate on learning what to do under normal circumstances, potentially learning by rote rather than understanding the inherent principles.

 

But that is insufficient, especially when taking some measure of responsibility for the safety of others. Much the more important is knowing what to do when something goes wrong, or is potentially about to do so. 

 

This is a principle that has wide application, not just to lock operation.

[zenataomm]

3 hours ago, Horace42 said:

All this talk of 'who is in charge' needs to be matched to 'who is responsible'.

 

 

You can't be in charge without responsibility, a CEO can end up in court through the actions of an employee they are in charge of.

You can delegate authority, you can not delegate responsibility on its own. 

[ditchcrawler]

6 hours ago, mayalld said:

 

 

When we did the Bunbury Shuffle last year, I was in charge because everybody agreed I would be!

 

I think on every occasion but 1 when I have done the Banbury shuffle I have been in charge because I was the only one who knew how to do it 

[Tacet]

6 hours ago, mayalld said:

 

The point that I am making is that whilst CRT own the lock all along, the boater is in charge of the lock whilst his boat is passing through.

 

 

And who is in charge of the pound, whilst your boat is passing through?

[mayalld]

4 minutes ago, Tacet said:

And who is in charge of the pound, whilst your boat is passing through?

 

I didn't notice the pound having equipment like a lock has.

 

I get it that some other people don't see it as I do, but there is an easy solution. Accept that a fair proportion of people do see it that way, and do not want outsiders interfering with the operation of a lock whilst their boat is in it.

 

Call them names (like Nick does) if you wish, but accept that you are not to impose your "help" on them.

[Tacet]

3 minutes ago, mayalld said:

 

I didn't notice the pound having equipment like a lock has.

 

Mostly, they do.  Gates and paddles at both ends - and a tendency to rise and fall.

 

That the boat steerer has a real say in the operation of a lock is clearly reasonable.  But it is less reasonable where the steerer is dawdling along - causing long delays due to inefficient working.

 

I appreciate one person's dawdling is another person's safe working, but if you're holding people up and not willing to accept help (or loose the second boat by), it is less reasonable.  We followed a pair of boats up the Shroppie last week and whilst they had the road, at every lock we were catching them before they had even entered the chamber.  With a crew of maybe 10-12, there was often not a windlass in sight, and if there was a windlass, it was nowhere near a paddle at the right time.  To be fair, there was no objection voiced to being assisted.

 

[Cheese]

3 hours ago, GuyBarry said:

… I have an occasional arrangement with the owner of one of the trip boats that I set the lock for him.  He phones me a few minutes before he's due there, and I fill or empty it as required, in exchange for a small consideration.  …

"A small consideration" might mean you are getting into more risky territory, as it is possibly creating a form of contract, and if anything goes wrong some liability on you.  If you are just setting the lock before his arrival, and doing nothing when his boat is in the lock, then the risk is probably minimal.  But if you are operating the lock with the trip boat in it, in exchange for money, you really ought to get some insurance.  Unless you can afford to lose a few million (or even tens of millions if there are lots of passengers).

[GuyBarry]

5 hours ago, RLWP said:

There is a totally non-controversial way for you to help out. On a lock flight, go ahead and set the next lock(s) for a boat. You can't be endangering a boat as there won't be one there

 

Bit difficult on a single lock!

 

That's exactly what I did when I was helping the boat up the flight at the start of the K&A.