What should we expect for our licence fee?

[teddington_lock]

I have no idea why it did it ! Wasn't ( as far as i know ) due to me messing it up and shearing it off.

9.00am , first lock was an upstream lock , so i shut the tail gates and filled the lock up , heard a weird crack , but didn't think too much of it.

Next lock was also an upstream lock , so i drained the lock ( thankfully empty of boats ) and tried to open the tail gates , the island side one came open , but the towpath side one stayed closed ! I walked round and looked and the gate ram had retracted but left part of it connected to the gate.

Guess it must have just been it's time to go ....

Anyway , by now , boats had started turning up and there was a queue head and tail. So , got into action and started using the old lock , and i can tell you , its hard work.

Once or twice , might be a bit of a giggle , but for the majority of the day , was no fun at all. Yard boys fixed it around 2pm ish .....

Just bad luck i guess ...

 

[angelaquayle]

Would we/I be bothering with this forum if we didn't 'give a toss'!!

Give me a chance and I will respond - I hadn't picked up on that until yesterday - I can't spend all day looking at the internet (much as I'd like to) - I suspect you guys would only start telling me the office people plainly have nothing better to do if I did!

 

[Brayman]

I hope, Angela, that you've worked out by now that Apollo types first and thinks later!
There is a lot of appreciation on the river for those at the sharp end, and your contribution here has always been much appreciated.
It is always worrying to us that we feel the brunt of lockkeepers annoyance and we don't and can't know why. You will appreciate the frustration when things aren't going as they should.

 

[IFS]

The chaps above oxford must be worth a mint to the river, or are they all yesteryear's men

 

[teddington_lock]

I was referring to the Lower Thames keepers ( perhaps i should have put that ) ...

Being that each gate on the launch lock at Tedders weighs just shy of 10 tons , it would be a heroic effort to move them all day long by hand . Nearly all of the lower Thames locks are significantly larger , wider and deeper than the beam locks above Oxford , thereby making them more difficult to operate manually by beams , presumably why they were electrified and not the ones up there.

It wasn't meant as a dig at them , but i've had a go of the gates at St. Johns, and i can tell you , it was significantly easier than Sunburys gates.

 

[apollo]

Ian, could you be any more patronising?

How many times have you run aground this year....?

We should not have to rely on this forum to talk to the EA at all - SHOULD we?

What is the point of doing a customer survey last year and then completely ignoring the results?

I believe there is only one way to get the attention of the EA, if every boat on the Thames witholds their fees in January, I think they might listen. But that aint going to happen Ian is it? Cos that might upset people.

I'll tell you what Ian, I'll leave it to you to report things nicely to EA and when I come back in 12months time I promise not to be shocked when things are exactly the same as they are now.

 

[Andrew_Fanner]

May have a way round the licence problem. SWMBO says we are poor now so may have to sell the boat.

 

[boatone]

Hmmm...whats the betting selling is going to get difficult for a while? /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[Andrew_Fanner]

[ QUOTE ]
Hmmm...whats the betting selling is going to get difficult for a while? /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

My best line of defence, along woth "get a fill time job"

 

[apollo]

Hi

Its now 6 days later, have you an update on why there were so many absent Lock keepers?

Mike