[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > On Thursday, January 04, 2007 4:23 PM [GMT+1=CET], > Adrian Stott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > "Mike Stevens" > > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> The biggest negative factor of eater transport is that > >> it is slow, thus incurring a higher wages cost than road or rail > >> transport. > > > > Up to a point, milord. > > > > With a big enough gauge, the size of the load makes up for the slower > > speed. The crucial statistic is tonne-miles/man-hour.
Unfortunately in attempting to raise that to a competitive level by increasing load size, you can come up against another limit: the size of consignment that the customer can receive (or the sender can despatch). If your factory is set up to receive 100 tons per working day by lorry, a 2000 tonne barge load once a month might not be practical, however well the transport economics stack up. And if you can, then you can also receive an entire trainload by rail - which is the most efficient way for rail freight to operate. > Yes. I was simplifying the argument to what was relevant to the existing > waterways I was discussing. > > Also, the bits of the BBR affected actually *are* accessible to barges > > now, but only at high tide. Not quite: they are accessible for periods a little before and a little after high tide, but at high tide there is insufficient headroom. The lock will enable them to enter the > > BBR at high tide, but to manoeuvre within them (on the Waterworks > > River) at all times. > I'd like to see a barge get under the bridges at either end of Prescott > Channel! Indeed - we had difficulty fitting a RIB under there at something close to high tide. The idea is (or was the last time I spoke to anyone about it) to hold back the level in the Prescott channel at a carefully chosen level about 3ft /1m below the level in the Limehouse cut / non-tidal Bow Backs etc, which is high enough to allow enough depth for the barges, but low enough that they can get under the bridges. > [about the new Prescott Lock] > > Is all the funding now secure? > I'm not up-to-date on that. A couple of months ago I was told by somebody > in BW that they were negotiating of the last bit of the funding package. That was still the case at the time of the December Parliamentary Waterways Group meeting. There is a shortfall of the order of 1.5 million. The Sports Minister seemed confident that it would be found. BW are sufficiently optimistic that it will be resolved that they have pencilled in a stoppage for the work - although as we've seen recently stoppage lists can change rapidly. A Waterscape stoppage alert duly landed on my computer announcing a closure of Waterworks channel for new lock construction, at precisely the point where we sent the latest issue of the mag to the printers, leading to some frantic phoning round to find out if it was true! Martin L
