>Maybe (at renewal time) we should be given a list of canals/rivers that we >want to use, the license then based on boat length & boat width & potential >miles/locks of our selected choice.
>Ron Jones I think that would be unworkable. Each year, each boat owner would demand to pay for only the waterways he wants to cruise that year. The reason this wouldn't work is that for the future of boating generally we have to recognise the value of the other waterways we can use, and pay for that value. <[email protected]> wrote: >No, I think a much better idea would be that you're all forced to have a >transponder fitted to your boat and then your movements are tracked by >satellite. If you move, you're tracked and charged; if you don't move you're >just charged anyway. Sounds fine to me ;-))) >Roger <[email protected]> wrote: >Just turn the clock back, employ lock keepers and pay a toll to go >through each lock. It turns out that there's no justification for charging based on the amount of boating you do. BW has estimated that the cost to it of a boat moving a km along a waterway is so small as not to be worth bothering with, and certainly not worth the cost of collecting. This has led me to conclude that the system should consist solely of an annual charge for each boat, that depends on the length of its cruising range (i.e. a standard £/km multiplied by the number of kilometres in the range). Simple to calculate (all you need is a spreadsheet with the waterways dimensions, and a database of boat sizes, both of which are already available). Simple and inexpensive to collect. And the chargng system could cover all waterways and be operated by a single collection body, with the proceeds distributed among the navigaton authorities depending on the proportions of the cruising ranges that are in each -- not a difficult program to write. Adrian Adrian Stott Tel. UK (0)7956-299966
