Club goes bust

[Tranona]

Bewl bridge must surely belong to Southern Water or whichever private company trousered this particular piece of public property when we sold off the family silver in the 1980s.
.

"Public property" does not necessarily equate to (free) public access. When water companies were state owned they still charged for access to their property - which in most cases was developed by private companies before being taken by the state. Reservoirs are not "natural" but man made. Public landlords can be just as bad or good as private ones.

 

[oldgit]

"Public property" does not necessarily equate to (free) public access.

.....It did in this particular case...and great deal of local concern when sell off was preposed.Much of which,turned out to be well founded.
A short history of Bewl.
First proposed in 1940s Planned and built by Southern Water.Part of the Medway catchment scheme.


http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...ql2LD64ns77szswbbQXCW4Q&bvm=bv.96339352,d.bGQ

Pretty certain a sailing club was there in the 1970s when we used the wander round the area and certain the car park was free...otherwise we would not have gone.

 

[lw395]

As far as I know there aren't that many alternatives in the area - and none that have the same sailing area.

Given the attitude of the landlord you have to suspect he thinks he can get more money from someone else so perhaps he already has plans and is deliberately forcing the club to close its doors

Bewl has/had a decent Flying Fifteen fleet, but a quick mooch around their results pages suggests activity was generally not that great, although it was a place you could sail 7 days a week not just race.
In the area, there are active clubs at Weir Wood and Chipstead. Then there are clubs inside the M25 such as Queen Mary, clubs on the coast and the River Medway.
This is not the first dinghy club to fold, nor will it be the last. But we don't have the participation there was in the 60s and 70s when every viable piece of water (and some not-so-viable!) seemed to have a club.
So how many clubs do we need and how much are we prepared to pay?
And how far are we prepared to drive?

I don't recall anyone complaining of fleets overcrowding their start lines just lately?

 

[bedouin]

Bewl has/had a decent Flying Fifteen fleet, but a quick mooch around their results pages suggests activity was generally not that great, although it was a place you could sail 7 days a week not just race.
In the area, there are active clubs at Weir Wood and Chipstead. Then there are clubs inside the M25 such as Queen Mary, clubs on the coast and the River Medway.
This is not the first dinghy club to fold, nor will it be the last. But we don't have the participation there was in the 60s and 70s when every viable piece of water (and some not-so-viable!) seemed to have a club.
So how many clubs do we need and how much are we prepared to pay?
And how far are we prepared to drive?

I don't recall anyone complaining of fleets overcrowding their start lines just lately?

My school used to sail at Chipstead (and I was a member there until about 30 years ago), and I've sailed at Queen Mary. Neither seem to be a patch on Bewl in terms of sailing (although I haven't actually sailed there). I hadn't heard of Weir Wood.

QM is hardly "near" to Bewl - must be at least an hour and a half in the car.

I would want a club where it was worthwhile going down for a couple of hours sailing - so no more than 30-45 mins away.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Welshman David Sullivan is a bit more colourful than just "a businessman". He made his money in porn - movies, magazines and sex shops - and even today still owns the Private Shops chain.

Googling "David Sullivan Karren Brady" is entertaining.

 

[lw395]

My school used to sail at Chipstead (and I was a member there until about 30 years ago), and I've sailed at Queen Mary. Neither seem to be a patch on Bewl in terms of sailing (although I haven't actually sailed there). I hadn't heard of Weir Wood.

QM is hardly "near" to Bewl - must be at least an hour and a half in the car.

I would want a club where it was worthwhile going down for a couple of hours sailing - so no more than 30-45 mins away.

The trouble is, Bewl was not a cheap 'locals' club.
I think all these clubs have a large catchment area.
But they were only fielding single-figure fleets in a handful of classes recently.
Bewl is OK sailingwise, but I don't think they have the full area, and the wind seemed quite odd coming down the various valleys or over the dam.
Possibly better in winter when it's full?
QM seems to get a lot more wind in my limited sampling.

Give me the sea any day!

 

[James_Calvert]

Used to have a large Solo fleet but it decamped en masse to Bough Beech, another reasonably local reservoir club.

Not surprised, their scale of charges did at least allow you to breathe for free, but not much else. I think the original idea was that the rent would be covered in part by a commercial sailing school but somehow this didn't happen and the club got landed with a disproportionate level of charges. They aren't the only users of the reservoir.

The dinghy park is massive, and full of dinghies, so it looks as if people could afford to park there but, aside from the Flying Fifteens, didn't do much sailing.

I was a fairly regular visitor supporting my dinghy sailing son at various events, until he went away to Uni. It's a great venue, and I hope dinghy sailing survives there.

 

[nimbusgb]

Talk of a local effort to ensure that any planning applications are made as 'challenging' as possible.

Bewl was a lovely venue, lots of water, about 400 dinghies in the park. Windsurfers, kayaks a good summer weekend bought in a couple of hundred people to race and cruise.

£160 000 has killed it. The cost of membership was set to cope with the rental, strangled to golden goose.

Still, some people are not happy unless they are making a million a day!

 

[Searush]

I find this amazing that a club can go bust. Who is the landlord? A private individual? Around here the clubs are in the end owned by the local council. There is no rent involved. although the swan River authority (state government impose rent on the water space.) I am continually reminded of how lucky we are as a colony of UK when right from the outset (Swan River colony 1829) a surveyor was sent to set up proper land ownership laws and titles thus never any argument about ownership and rights of way etc. compared to mother land suffering under ancient rights ownership etc. olewill

Australia isn't exactly short of room for the population though is it? The UK population is almost 65million, most of that on about 1/3 of the land mass. Land, especially in the South East is cripplingly expensive to rent or buy.