Win a Pair of Tickets to The Crick Boat Show 2012!

The 2012 Crick Boat Show will be a four-day show on 2nd-5th June 2012 and this year it includes some special celebrations for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. The event is made possible by British Waterways and Crick Marina and is organised by the publishers of Waterways World magazine.

For families there will be children’s activities, learning experiences, entertainers and traditional rides and games. Children under 5 have free entry. There will be live bands and a diversity of food and drink options. There will also be gourmet food and arts and crafts in the new Water Vole Craft and Food Marquee. The heritage area will showcase the history of the waterways and the huge Kingfisher Boating Marquee will be packed with waterways related products, services, associations and businesses. Not forgetting of course the essential parts of any canal festival; there will be a real ale bar and dozens of colourful boats.

Tickets and camping/mooring passes are now on sale on the Crick Boat Show website.

http://www.crickboatshow.com/tickets.html

You can also book your tickets by calling 01283 742972.

However, thanks to the lovely people at Waterways World I will be there with my family and they’ve offered me six more weekend passes to give away as three pairs, to readers of my blog. These give entry to any day of the show or indeed all four days.

Hope to see you there!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Urgent: Your Boat is Causing an Obstruction!

Low water level - Startops Reservoir

I'm not usually one of those boating bloggers that rants against BW, so my apologies in advance because this is a bit of a rant.

Last Thursday I received an email from the BW Boating Co-ordinator South East to say that “The mooring of your boat is causing an obstruction to waterway staff and therefore it is essential that you remove the boat urgently.”

This was my reply.

Dear Boating Co-ordinator

On Monday afternoon I checked my email and found that the Tring Summit would be closed as of Wednesday and that we would have to vacate our winter mooring. At this extremely short notice my husband arranged to take Tuesday off work so that he could move our boat. I went to work, my husband took the children to nursery and by 9am he had begun working through the Marsworth flight.

At 11.25am on Tuesday 10th BW sent me some further information “regarding the water levels in the area where you currently have a winter mooring.” This lengthy explanation of the problem again re-iterated that the section would be closed to through traffic and moored boats from Wednesday 11th onwards. The document said that displaced boats could relocate their moorings

“to the north, adjacent to Marsworth yard. Good parking and facilities are available.”

Later that day we received a further email admitting that this was short notice, and giving boaters until Saturday to relocate. My husband had by then moored on the towpath in Marsworth but I told him that as winter moorers we'd received an email suggesting that we could moor adjacent to the Marsworth yard, allowing us the convenience of good parking and facilities. He moved the boat again.

Today the local enforcement officer told my husband that we should have been moored north of the bridge on a towpath mooring. Later today I got home from work to find two urgent voicemails and an email accusing us of causing an obstruction and asking us to move again, immediately.

I did not appreciate the tone of these messages when we have gone out of our way to move quickly to the place we were told to. We are unable to take any more time off work. If BW staff need access to the site they may relocate our boat as necessary to the north side of the bridge but I believe my husband has already requested that we are moored against the towpath (not double moored) as we have young children and a pushchair to get on and off the boat.

As I have since found out, local water-based businesses were invited to a crisis meeting last Saturday about the water level problem so I am sure this has not arisen completely “out of the blue”. Following the short notice, inconvenience and misinformation we've experienced I would think an apology would have been more appropriate than the emails, voice mails and conversations we've had with BW staff that seem to suggest we have done something wrong. This is unfortunately another incidence where BW has made me feel that I am an inconvenience instead of a valued customer. We moved as quickly as possible to the place where we were told to and are being made to feel as if we've done something wrong.


Boat Wife



Dear BW

I write to confirm that I have just spoken to the enforcement officer and we will be moving our boat tomorrow to Marsworth winter moorings, north of the bridge. Given that she has said this will be ok, I am disappointed that we had to be so stressed out yesterday by messages such as "urgent" and "immediate". Please forward my feedback to the people who handle your communications strategy.

Thanks

Boat Wife




Dear Boating Co-ordinator

CC: Senior Waterway Manager


Thank you for your apology.

I do indeed think we were misled about where to moor. I had assumed we were specifically told to go to the BW yard because of anticipated congestion in the area, and the fact that we had paid for a winter mooring.

I am working this afternoon, but if BW staff do need to move my boat today please ask them to leave me a voice message explaining where it now is. My husband got the impression from the enforcement officer that it would have to be moved urgently. Otherwise we will try to find an alternative mooring tomorrow, when we are not working.

Thanks

Boat Wife


 Have linked this up to the Friday Rant at http://www.muddlingalongmummy.com/

Epilogue


The original urgent voicemail I received from the enforcement officer said,
“I know that you have a winter mooring but you should be on the towpath. We have two staff boats coming down there and they need to get on to the wharf.”
I know that BW are doing some work at the yard and I didn’t want to obstruct any working boats needing access, so we moved our boat on Saturday.

On Sunday, the enforcement officer (who usually moors on the Tring summit) had moved her own residential craft onto the mooring adjacent to the BW yard.



Read more about the Tring summit closure.

The pictures below show the current low water levels in the reservoirs and above Marsworth bottom lock.

When Freedom is Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Be Free!

A Boat-Wife’s Response to the BW Consultation
http://www.britishwaterways.co.uk/listening-to-you/consultations-and-reviews/current-consultations

Re: The Proposals for the Management of Moorings on the Rivers Lea and Stort, Hertford Union and Regent’s Canals.

What are your views on current levels of boating and mooring in the plan area?

I am happy with the current levels of boating and mooring in the area. Residential boaters are growing in number and are an important part of this consultation process. The increase of boats used as homes throughout London make the towpath a safer place to enjoy for all. A few years ago I would not have moored in East London, but in recent years I was pleased to see a welcoming community of boats there with several ‘safe’ moorings. I believe these moored boats make the place a safer and more attractive place for walkers, cyclists, anglers and other towpath users.

What effect (e.g. good, bad, none) does the current level of boating and mooring have on your enjoyment of the waterways and park?

I cruised down these rivers and canals (from the River Stort to Islington) last Autumn and found plenty of places to moor. The moorings that I chose were near other boats because of the ‘safety in numbers’ factor. While I agree that moorings in London in general are popular, the only place I have ever actually been unable to secure a visitor mooring is Camden. This is since double mooring was prohibited there. (I wrote to BW at the time to complain that this most popular visitor mooring has had it’s availability halved, apparently at the request of the local trip boats.) I would say the current level of boating in the plan area has a good effect on my enjoyment of the waterways.

In general, what are your views on the proposals for managing moorings?

I do find the legal side of this very complicated. I am not sure if the 1995 British Waterways Act allows BW to redefine 'neighbourhoods' and dictate how far a continuous cruiser must move after 14 days. I’ve had a look at Section 17 (3) and understand that a boater must satisfy the board that the vessel will be used bona fide for navigation.

However, the proposed new mooring charges seem to be more like ‘parking fines’. The definition of "bona fide for navigation" in the BW Mooring Guidance for Continuous Cruisers is misleading. If a boat continues its journey after mooring in one place for 14 days then I believe that is cruising ‘in good faith’. But it seems that the phrase in the law; “bona fide for navigation” is open to different interpretations.

My view is that the new guidelines would require residential boaters and pleasure boaters to travel much larger distances, making leisurely cruising and visiting attractive sites much more difficult. They seem particularly biased towards making living aboard without a mooring very difficult.

I have lived on a boat for eleven years. In recent years I have married and had two children. Our family continuously cruises in the summer and pays for a mooring during the winter. I was offended to read statements in the media recently that suggest choosing a continuously cruising lifestyle is inappropriate for a family.

Clive Henderson, chairman of the Inland Waterways Association (IWA), was quoted in The Guardian on Wednesday 27 April 2011 as saying,

"If a family chooses to take up boating and make it their place of residence, then it's clear what the obligations are. I can't believe continuous cruising is suitable for anyone with a job or with children at school."

It is likely that the British Waterways Guidelines for Continuous Cruisers have encouraged this kind of viewpoint.

"We're refining our mooring guidance," a BW spokesman said in The Guardian article. "Boaters will still be required to engage in a genuine and ongoing cruise or journey of some length.

"Some [people] who knowingly signed up for a continuous cruiser lifestyle may have to accept this is not a suitable option for them. Where this is the case … we will welcome the help of other agencies … to provide housing."

A house is not my preferred option, or an affordable option and BW should respect my wish to choose my own home and lifestyle.

The guidelines suggest that a boat should move a significant distance around the system but this is the BW interpretation of the 1995 British Waterways Act.  I do not advocate “bridge hopping” or staying longer than 14 days but I have not seen any evidence to suggest that the length of the journeys that I currently undertake, inconvenience other waterways users. The upper Lea and Stort are definitely not congested, there are long stretches without any moored boats at all. There is no difficulty in finding a mooring. While levels of boating have increased on the lower Lea I would still not describe it as congested.

“A "cruise" is a journey or series of journeys "making for no particular place or calling at a series of places". (Shorter Oxford Dictionary.)

“Such journey or cruise must take place "throughout the period of [the licence]" and therefore requires progression around the network, or at least a significant part of it.” (BW Guidelines.)

Why does a series of journeys require significant progression around the network? During the summers that I have cruised on my boat I believe I have made journeys of significant length, (for example Islington to Bishops Stortford and back). I don’t know if this would satisfy the board that I was using my boat bona fide for navigation, but if I move every 14 days I do not think I contribute to congestion.

Living aboard is already a very challenging but rewarding lifestyle. Commuting to childcare and work is sometimes difficult but currently possible. I am concerned how the proposal will affect residential boaters currently cruising in the planned area. I am very concerned that if these proposals are accepted on the Lea and Stort then they may eventually become the rules for the whole canal system, making life for my family very difficult.

The proposals will also adversely affect leisure boaters, holiday boaters and hire boaters on the Lea and Stort. Decreasing the use of these rivers will simply increase usage on other parts of the system. The apparently increasing number of people choosing boats as their homes, particularly in London, surely means that there is an increasing number of licence fees to spend on sanitary, rubbish disposal and water facilities in popular areas?

I am not aware of any evidence to back up the problems described on these waterways, that the proposal plans to address. Continuous cruisers are not the main culprits in overstaying on visitor moorings. I feel as if the proposed ‘charges’ or fines are a discriminatory way of increasing revenue by targeting one particular type of boater.

Possessions spilling on to the towpath are not something I have encountered as a common problem and I have travelled Hertfordshire, Essex and London extensively over the last eleven years. (Is that a significant progression around the network?) This should be dealt with by approaching the individuals concerned and not legislating against a particular group of people.

Historically, I believe parliament has not allowed BW to introduce restrictions like those described in this proposal, (e.g. the 1990 Private Bill that eventually became the 1995 British Waterways Act.)

In general, my view is that the proposals are discriminatory and unnecessary. 

How will you be affected by the proposals?

My family have spent two summers cruising the rivers Lea and Stort, (2008 and 2010) and commuting to childcare and work in London. There are plenty of towpath moorings and visitor moorings on these rivers and many beautiful places to visit. If the mooring guidance for these areas is changed I cannot see that it would be practical for my family to ever visit this area again. A family on board (whether on holiday or residential) has a limited amount of time per day that they can actually spend cruising and working locks, because there are meals to prepare and children to care for.

Do you have any practical suggestions to make implementation easier / improve it?

1. Enforce the existing 14 day rule, remaining flexible about circumstances where it is reasonable to stay in one neighbourhood for longer. Residential boaters can be given cheap moorings at popular sites in exchange for acting as local wardens. (This is something BW already do.) A permanent residential boater at each popular site can act as a ‘Welcome Boat’ supplying BW information and providing security in inner city areas. They could also report local maintenance problems.
2. Welcome the fact that residential boating is growing. Create more residential moorings as a way of increasing revenue.
3. Research ways to increase revenue without targeting one particular group of boaters.
4. Stop portraying liveaboard boaters without a mooring as a problem. We should not all be portrayed as “bridge hoppers” when so many of us are engaged in a genuine progressive journey.
5. Stop mis-interpreting the 1995 British Waterways Act. I think the current guidelines should be rewritten. As BW promotes the waterways as a leisure resource, let us enjoy them at a leisurely pace. Individuals have the right to choose the length, speed and direction of their own personal journey. A nice metaphor for life, don’t you think?!  

Send your own response by email to Damian Kemp (Project Officer) at Damian.kemp@britishwaterways.co.uk

You don’t have to waffle on like I did. Just a brief note with your thoughts will do.

You have until Tuesday 31^st May!

Please share this info with your friends by clicking the links below to go to Facebook and Twitter.

Letter to The Inland Waterways Association

Narrowboats spelled out the word 'HOME' last Saturday at a community canal event in East London

Photo by Katrin Thomas

www.katrinthomas.com

More about HOME on London Boaters Facebook page.

The Inland Waterways Association (IWA) is a charity which advocates the conservation, use, maintenance, restoration and development of England’s inland waterways for public benefit.

Draft response by IWA on BW Lee & Stort mooring consultation

Dr Stephen Haigh has written a fantastic response to IWA and has permitted me to publish it here.

RE: Draft response by IWA on the Lee and Stort consultation.

Dear  IWA, having read your charities responses to BWs new mooring plans I felt I must contact you to comment on some of the opinions and wording in the document.

I have a continuous cruiser (CC) licence and live on my boat with my six-month-old daughter and partner, have lived aboard since 2007 and have cruised most of the canal and river network in England in this period.  I now enjoy cruising around the London waterways network and greatly respect the canal and its heritage.

IWA’s comments I object to or think are ill judged I’ll list in parenthesis and in the order they appear in your document.

1)      You state: ‘permanently moored boats have blighted many parts of the system, as they set up camp’. 

This phrasing is offensive to CCers like myself, is without justification, and should be removed.

2)      You state: ‘There is very little in the proposed plan which would inconvenience bona fide continuous cruisers and most other leisure boaters.’ 

Many long-break cruisers with home moorings would find two weeks, too short a period for leisurely exploration of the Stort. 

3)       You State: ‘leisure boaters race down the lower Lee aiming for a safe London moorings such as Limehouse or Little Venice’. 

Think of the amount of CCers who would be racing around if BWs proposals were implemented.  Moreover, there are a great many safe moorings other than Little Venice and Limehouse in central London thanks to the community of CCers that visit those mooring and whom all know each other, producing a safer environment for all.

4)      You State: ‘kill the problem and act as a discouragement for future abuse’. 

This statement is worded poorly when you are talking about people with families.

5)      You State: ‘those trying to ‘squat’ and commute’. 

No CCer is trying to squat.  They own their own licensed boats and have a legitimate right to moor.  This phrase should be removed.

6)      You State: ‘More action needs to be done to prevent moorers taking over the towpath and declaring ʻownershipʼ of a particular section of waterspace’.   

No one has declared ownership of anything.  Unless you have written evidence for it, this phrase is redundant without foundation.

Your attention to the above issues and wording would be greatly appreciated, before a final response to BW is submitted.  Many thanks.  I look forward to hearing from you. 

Yours Faithfully 

Dr. S. N. Haigh

Useful links

BW Consultations http://www.britishwaterways.co.uk/listening-to-you/consultations-and-reviews/current-consultations

London Boaters Community Website

Consultation paper http://www.marmadukedando.com/bw-mooring-plans.PDF

K  & A Boating Community

Wikipedia Continuous Cruiser article

Liveaboard Forum (blog) http://liveaboard-forum.blogspot.com/2011/01/continuous-cruising-myth.html

The Guardian Newspaper

This picture depicts a Boat-Wife defending her rights

Pirates of the Carribbean

What can you do?

Write to BW, You can easily respond to the consultation using this feedback form.

http://www.britishwaterways.co.uk/media/documents/BW_Lee_Mooring_Proposals_Feedback_Form.doc

Tell your friends what is happening to London’s continuously cruising narrowboaters.

Click below to share this post on Facebook and Twitter.

Thanks in advance for your support.

Ahoy there Commodore!

 The next day, the Doctor had to work. I took the kids on the train to Hertfordshire to see The Boat. It was a golden sunshiney day. The boat was perfect. I put in an offer before That Other Bloke even saw it. That Other Bloke made an offer too. We had to wait another day, to hear who’s offer had been accepted. The girls and I returned home to find a ‘ticket’ on our boat: an official ‘Patrol Notice’ from British Waterways, urging us to continue with our journey. 

Without a winter mooring this year the conditions of our boat licence require us to continue cruising throughout the winter. If a boat has  a 'continuous cruising' licence it must move on a regular basis. A boat without a mooring must be genuinely used for navigation and should not stay in the same place or neighbourhood for more than 14 days (or a longer period as is reasonable in the circumstances). According to the BW guidelines for continuous cruisers It is the boater’s responsibility to satisfy British Waterways that these legal requirements are met. The question is, how should you define ‘place’ or ‘neighbourhood’?

This is a very complicated legal area and a subject that is under much debate at the moment. BW are currently holding a consultation where they plan to re-define what constitutes a 'neighbourhood' on the rivers Lea and Stort. British Waterways believe that there is a problem in Hackney where there are a lot of boats moored ‘on the towpath’, specifically in the area to be used for the Olympics.  It is possible that when the (licence paying) continuous cruisers are removed from the area, that there will then be visitor moorings available to purchase, attracting an appropriate mooring fee fitting to those boaters that wish to attend the Olympics.

I would strongly urge anyone who is interested the lifestyle that I am describing on this blog, to take five minutes to read some further information at http://www.londonboaters.org/  and to make your views known to BW. (See also this recent Guardian article) 

However, for this post I will try to keep to how this affects my family personally.

Every summer we enjoy taking what the guidelines define as a “genuine progressive journey”. From our winter mooring in Angel we have travelled as far as Hemel Hempstead on the Grand Union and Bishops Stortford on the River Stort. We enjoy discovering new neighbourhoods and moving every 14 days.

However, the weather makes cruising less pleasant in winter and canal ‘stoppages’ for maintenance can restrict cruising during winter months. So we always apply for, and pay for, a winter mooring in Angel, Islington. Because of this our GP, our health visitor, childminder and Big Sister’s nursery are in Islington. A balance of cruising in summer and mooring in winter has worked very well for us for eight years. During summer we would take Big Sister on the train from The Countryside to the childminder’s home in Angel.
This winter, we now have two children, but commuting with a double pushchair in the London rush hour is a different ball-game. I just can’t hold the weight of two kids on a tube escalator in a double push chair, and you’d be lucky to get it on an overcrowded London bus. Folding the contraption involves partly dismantling the thing whilst holding a baby and controlling a three year old. It’s just not practical. (Believe me, I have tried it. My 3 year old had to hold the baby, who was writhing on the pavement, while I wrestled with the pushchair, and the bus driver patiently waited.) But my maternity leave was over, the children had to go to childcare and we did our best to sort it out. I confess that we did linger too long at the Angel visitor moorings.


The British Waterways guidelines explain that circumstances where it is reasonable to stay for longer than 14 days are only where cruising is prevented by causes outside the reasonable control of the boater. For example, engine break down, canal stoppages or serious illness. “Unacceptable reasons for staying longer than 14 days in a neighbourhood or locality are a need to stay within commuting distance of a place of work or of study (e.g. a school or college).” Lingering too long can earn you the derogatory nick-name of “continuous moorer” from other genuinely cruising boaters. British Waterways calls it “bridge hopping” if you do not move far enough, often enough. I am not defending overstaying at a visitor mooring without an acceptable reason. However, I am concerned that redefining ‘neighbourhood’ will dramatically increase the distances that boaters like me have to travel every 14 days.

"Continuous Cruisers (houseboat owners without a fixed mooring) usually live and move in their homes around a certain area, their children attend local schools, they have jobs based locally, they have access to healthcare for themselves and their families, and they have strong links within the local community we’re all part of." London Boaters Website.

The BW guidelines do not have the force of law but attempt to interpret the law as set out in s.17 British Waterways Act 1995.

The London Boaters group have collated some guidance to London’s continuous cruisers, in helping us to understand where we stand legally.

“It is said, Section 17 (3) is a compromise and as such open to the various interpretations that have lead to such works of fiction as the ‘mooring guidance for continuous cruisers’ and the term ‘continuous cruiser’ itself as British Waterways have made successive attempts to dilute and subvert the application of this law. A law that allows most liveaboards to live the way they choose to.”

The Kennet and Avon Community Boaters website is another good resource that is currently commenting on this issue:

“Damian Kemp of BW clarified that changes to mooring zones have to be approved by the BW Boating Team, headed by Sally Ash, and that the local waterway managers have no power to change mooring zones. BW has stated that it wants to start implementing the local mooring strategy by mid to late July 2011, in other words to have the new mooring restrictions in place.

...The 1995 British Waterways Act did not define “place” or specify any minimum distance or cruising pattern, and so the mooring strategy steering group is being asked to set a standard which is beyond BW’s legal powers to enforce.” (K and A community website.)

What do you think? Please take a moment to write a comment on The London Boating Communities Facebook Page.  stating your connection with the waterways, i.e: walker, local resident, fisherman, boater etc. British Waterways claim that there is widespread opposition from dog-walkers, anglers and other canal users to the recent increase in boats on the River Lea.


Getting a ‘ticket’ on the day that we returned from viewing this Dream Boat seemed like a sign. This time we are going to leave London for good. Obviously we are not going to escape any new regulations imposed by British Waterways, but we will be leaving an area where visitor moorings are popular and over populated.


The next day the vendor accepted our offer. We beat That Other Bloke! The boat shall be ours! I phoned Captain Dad to update him on our lifestyle changes. Captain Dad is a bearded Merchant Seaman. He has spent his life cruising the oceans of the world and lives in a sunny house in a Capetown suburb, with Table Mountain in the distance.
“I’m going to be captain of two ships: A fleet!” I told him proudly.
“That would make you a commodore,” he replied proudly.

Me, taking command of my new vessel*.

What Can You Do?

You are entitled to let British Waterways know your views and since you have not been consulted I encourage you to send a response to their proposals:

http://www.britishwaterways.co.uk/media/documents/BW_Lee_Mooring_Proposals_Feedback_Form.doc

If you don’t have access to the internet you can send a letter to Damian at British Waterways, 64 Clarendon Rd, Watford, WD17 1DA.

Even if you don’t agree with the London Boaters it is your right to have your views heard. If you do agree with us please argue on our behalf. Your support is appreciated.

*Photo Credit: The picture of Kiera Knightly as Elizabeth Swann comes from The Torch Online.com