Bridgewater Reciprocal agreement?

[AndrewIC]

I'm looking at the Bridgewater licensing page for the current reciprocal agreement info, and it says:

 

C&RT licence holders may remain on the Bridgewater Canal for periods not exceeding seven consecutive days.

C&RT craft wishing to extend beyond the 7 day reciprocal arrangement period must obtain a temporary short term Bridgewater Canal Licence at a cost of £40 for 7 consecutive days.

 

i can't find any reference anywhere (any longer?) to the 28-day no return stipulation which has been the cause of so much comment. Has it been removed Now, or was it never documented on the website? 

[TheBiscuits]

http://www.bridgewatercanal.co.uk/news/amendmentsforagreement

 

http://www.bridgewatercanal.co.uk/news/crtrecipricolagreement

Edited August 9, 2018 by TheBiscuits

[Jim Riley]

I see return tickets are now available, to come back through, eg returning from Liverpool. Tickets available by phone, website or from the enforcement officer. I'll pay the enforcement officer if he stops me then. 

[pearley]

13 minutes ago, Jim Riley said:

I see return tickets are now available, to come back through, eg returning from Liverpool. Tickets available by phone, website or from the enforcement officer. I'll pay the enforcement officer if he stops me then. 

Just make sure you get a receipt. 

[Jim Riley]

37 minutes ago, pearley said:

Just make sure you get a receipt. 

Oh yes, and see ID first. Is it still Sonny, has his "customer interface training' worked? I believe there were so many complaints he had his legs smacked and was sent on a course. 

[frangar]

4 minutes ago, Jim Riley said:

Oh yes, and see ID first. Is it still Sonny, has his "customer interface training' worked? I believe there were so many complaints he had his legs smacked and was sent on a course. 

Not to mention a few full immersions.....

 

i have to say i wouldnt pay for a return transit unless challenged....Peels attitude is lacklustre towards boats at best....I might feel slightly more charitable if they provided some boater facilities like refuse disposal or secure visitor moorings in central Manchester rather than making the few half decent moorings into a "marIna" or shutting some down to allow a pop concert....

[ditchcrawler]

25 minutes ago, Jim Riley said:

Oh yes, and see ID first. Is it still Sonny, has his "customer interface training' worked? I believe there were so many complaints he had his legs smacked and was sent on a course. 

I met him this year, very helpful and a perfect gentleman. Not what I was expecting 

[MHS]

We really enjoy the stretch through Lynn and past Dunham Massey. It’s a shame they couldn’t change the agreement to allow:

 

A maximum of 7 days in any 35 day period. 

 

i.e. you could transit In 4 days, and return free if you’re off it in 3 days. We are hoping to visit Liverpool next year, and will not be hanging around the Bridgewater for long, due to time constraints. 

[Sea Dog]

We just spent a very pleasant week on the Bridgewater without being bothered at all.  Were we lucky or did we just not do anything to attract attention?

[philjw]

1 hour ago, Sea Dog said:

We just spent a very pleasant week on the Bridgewater without being bothered at all.  Were we lucky or did we just not do anything to attract attention?

 

Looks like you were the perfect visitor and you took the 7 days you were allowed.

[AndrewIC]

8 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

http://www.bridgewatercanal.co.uk/news/amendmentsforagreement

 

http://www.bridgewatercanal.co.uk/news/crtrecipricolagreement

Ah, thanks, I thought it was on the licensing page with the rest of the reciprocal agreement. The Wayback Machine suggests that I was imagining it! Was thinking of venturing up that way, apparently they have water

[WarringtonWhite]

Must say, I was on the Bridgewater last year, dreading being accosted by Sonny after what I have read on this forum. 

 

Then it happened, a knock on the boat...... the one who must be obeyed just said - be nice.  I was and so was he.  We had a good 10 minute chat, he told me the rules, gave me a business card and told us to give him a call if there is any issues.

 

I came away from that meeting with him thinking WTF.  I had expected the son of Satan to be ripping my throat out and feeding it to his evil hounds.  I suppose if I had gone and greeted him aggressively it would have been different.  Im very much the same - talk to me and Im a nice fella to know, talk at me and im a bar steward, be aggressive towards me and your next thought will be - "how did i end up down here?" closely followed by "O that hurt!"

 

I think we have all met people on the cut who are great people but we will all have met people on the cut who are a confrontational and aggressive for the hell of it.  I suppose if you are having conversations with the later 4 or 5 times a week, even if the other 50 are great people, you will approach each boat any boat with trepidation.  

 

All I can say is that it worked for me and once they open Wigan Flight and I will no doubt be having a 10 minute conversation with him again... maybe even make him a brew (i know.... radical thinking, hey)

[Mike Todd]

18 minutes ago, WarringtonWhite said:

Must say, I was on the Bridgewater last year, dreading being accosted by Sonny after what I have read on this forum. 

 

Then it happened, a knock on the boat...... the one who must be obeyed just said - be nice.  I was and so was he.  We had a good 10 minute chat, he told me the rules, gave me a business card and told us to give him a call if there is any issues.

 

I came away from that meeting with him thinking WTF.  I had expected the son of Satan to be ripping my throat out and feeding it to his evil hounds.  I suppose if I had gone and greeted him aggressively it would have been different.  Im very much the same - talk to me and Im a nice fella to know, talk at me and im a bar steward, be aggressive towards me and your next thought will be - "how did i end up down here?" closely followed by "O that hurt!"

 

I think we have all met people on the cut who are great people but we will all have met people on the cut who are a confrontational and aggressive for the hell of it.  I suppose if you are having conversations with the later 4 or 5 times a week, even if the other 50 are great people, you will approach each boat any boat with trepidation.  

 

All I can say is that it worked for me and once they open Wigan Flight and I will no doubt be having a 10 minute conversation with him again... maybe even make him a brew (i know.... radical thinking, hey)

Many 'nice' people can also be jobsworths when under pressure. As a parallel thread indicates, plenty of boaters try to push the boundaries sometimes well beyond reasonable breaking point. This is when problems occur: someone strays over the boundary and thinks that they should be allowed a free margin of error. Along comes an enforcement officer (roads, canals or wherever) and gently points out the issue and the boater responds aggressively. What else can you expect to be the outcome? OTOH, there are employers who set staff silly rules (see Sam Smiths?) that remove any opportunity for the tiniest bit of discretion. Rules generally are designed on an 80-20 principle. They work most of the time in ways that most people think are sensible. From time to time there are cases where they don't work in ways that gain popular support and that is where properly trained and supported staff can make a real difference. Personally, we have never yet had to call on CaRT for permission to overstay but from all that I have heard, privately and publicly, they are probably among the better end of the scale when it comes to using common sense. Of course there will always be people who feel hard done by and the more that discretion is allowed, the more likely it is that this will happen (you let him/her stay, why not me?).

 

I'm not sure that would have ever wanted to be in an enforcement job!

[Jim Riley]

There are now cheaper return tickets are available for £20 for 3 days, if my memory serves me right, so Peel have been listening, though I still think we should be able to split the 7 days free. I'll await a knock before I pay. Looks like Sonny's training worked.

[David Mack]

14 hours ago, MHS said:

We really enjoy the stretch through Lynn and past Dunham Massey. It’s a shame they couldn’t change the agreement to allow:

 

A maximum of 7 days in any 35 day period. 

 

i.e. you could transit In 4 days, and return free if you’re off it in 3 days. We are hoping to visit Liverpool next year, and will not be hanging around the Bridgewater for long, due to time constraints. 

 

1 hour ago, Jim Riley said:

There are now cheaper return tickets are available for £20 for 3 days, if my memory serves me right, so Peel have been listening, though I still think we should be able to split the 7 days free. I'll await a knock before I pay. Looks like Sonny's training worked.

 

I suspect the problem for Peel is that far more CRT licenced boats use the Bridgewater than vice versa. And the increase in CCers/CMers on CRT waters has led to more CRT licenced boats staying too long on the Bridgewater (not least to be off the radar of CRT enforcement). So Peel had to do something. The return ticket looks like a reasonable compromise.

 

When this all kicked off a couple of years ago, there were complaints that some hire boaters doing the Cheshire Ring were being charged £40 for a short transit, just because other hirers of the same boat had done the trip in the previous 4 weeks. And Peel wouldn't issues annual licences to boats which didn't have a Bridgewater mooring. I haven't heard that this has been addressed, but neither have I heard more recent complaints from hire companies. Does anybody know if this has been sorted?