"Roger Millin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >I quote from an earlier post of mine: >Up to a point Sir Humphrey, but a wide beam craft will always require >dredging to a wider(better) standard than could be 'got away with' >for narrow beam craft. I'm not encouraging poor dredging standards, >only pointing out that more significant dredging will be required for >your type of craft at a time when waterway maintenance budgets are in >free-fall.
Periodic dredging, carried out every few years whenever the siltation has reduced the dimensions of the actual water cross-section below the values required for the convenient passage of craft, to remove all the silt that has accumulated since the last time such dredging took place, is maintenance. It is a "revenue" item, in localauthorityspeak. One-time dredging to recover a larger (best, the original) water cross-section after a long time during which this cross-section had not been recovered during dredging, is restoration. It is not maintenance. It is a "capital" item. The problem is that NT has let the Wey deteriorate to the point that it now needs to do the latter. Although it does that sort of thing regularly for e.g. its stately homes (i.e. when it restores them), it has persistently refused to consider it for the Wey. However, the (periodic) cost of the former will be pretty much the same to NT irrespective of whether the latter is done. As a closing point, not doing dredging is *not* a way of saving money, as the silt continues to be deposited in the channel and has to be removed at some point. In fact, putting it off actually *wastes* money, as navigation in a restricted channel increases the erosion of the banks, which is expensive to fix and which deposits more silt in the channel (which must then also be removed). So the additional maintenance cost of providing a channel for full-gauge craft is actually a myth. NT has the money to recover the original profile on the Wey -- it is quite a rich outfit -- but it has simply refused to do so. That's why I would like to replace it as the navigation authority. Adrian Adrian Stott 07956-299966
