News

Robin Ford of the Thames Traditional Boat Rally writes:

Dear Tradrally supporter

Following this year’s cancellation of The Rally and the retirement of our Chairman and President after 20 years or so service, the  time has come to take a fresh look at how The rally should develop in the future and how it should be run.

This year’s cancellation was due to conditions after the winter floods on the traditional site at Fawley Meadows, Henley, but its cancellation has sparked considerable support for the concept of a traditional boat rally and several participating societies and clubs are holding their own smaller scale participants -only events as a form of compensation.

There has been much discussion as to how The Rally should be developed and run for the future (if at all) and a meeting of interested parties will be organised in September: probably at Penton Hook Yacht Club.

The Rally has been run by Thames Traditional Boat Rally Ltd, a company limited by guarantee, and Janet Rivers Goodhead has offered to stay on as Treasurer and Robin Ford has agreed to stay on as Marketing Manager or adviser to a new participant. Mike Phillips is also prepared to continue as Webmaster.

The purpose of this document is to seek your views on the way The Rally should develop and be managed for the future. We should be very grateful if you could complete the attached questionnaire and email or send it back to us at the address shown.

Whether you are a boat owner, day visitor, trade exhibitor or society, your views are important to us. Please do not be restricted by the questions asked: all comments and ideas will be welcomed.

Regards
Robin Ford

 

You can download a copy of the questionnaire here.

Colin Wise is looking to arrange wedding transport for his daughter by steamboat to The Old Mill in Aldermaston on the River Kennet on August 24th.

Please contact the SBA secretary Kingsley Robinson (kingsleyrobinson@hotmail.com) if you are able to help.

National Historic Ship UK’s Photo Competition is currently still open for you to submit entries and today we they very pleased to announce an increase in the monetary prize from £500 to £1000!  
 
Now in its fifth year, the competition is aimed at all photographers of all ages and is dedicated to encouraging everyone to engage with historic vessels or maritime themes.
 
OVERALL COMPETITION PRIZE: marine equipment – a wireless wind, speed and depth system with NMEA system sponsored by Raymarine, to be donated to a registered historic vessel and a monetary prize of £1000, to be awarded on a theme or activity involving a registered historic vessel (for example, attending maritime festivals, conservation or maintenance work, maritime skills training, educational programmes held on board an historic vessel).
 
YOUNG PHOTOGRAPHER CATEGORY, ages 4-18 (Category E): Win an iPad for your school and a visit to an historic vessel for you and up to three family members.

The competition is open for entries until 31 August 2014. 

More details of the competition are available here.

The Canal & River Trust has published its 2013/14 Annual Report & Accounts at its Annual Meeting in Birmingham. Despite a year of extremes, from a very dry summer to extreme winter rainfall, our first full year’s reporting shows a promising foundation for our new charity. This includes a growth in the number of people volunteering to help and a strong commercial performance, which has led to greater than planned spend on repairing and looking after the network.

Highlights for the year include:

• More than £120m invested in repairing and restoring the waterways, with the proportion of principal assets in the two worst condition grades reduced to 14.7 per cent (2012/13:15.2 per cent)
• 142 lock gates replaced or refurbished and more than 68 miles of waterways dredged, with the removal of over 90,000 m3 of silt
• Completion of the £2m+ repair to the Trent & Mersey Canal following the breach at Dutton
• Major repairs to the Monmouthshire & Brecon and Llangollen canals following the damage wreaked by the winter floods
• 32,440 licensed boats (excluding boat licences of one month or less) as at 31 March 2014 – a 0.4 per cent increase on the number recorded on 31 March 2013 (32,311)
• Volunteers gave over 51,000 days helping to look after the canals and rivers (2012/13: 29,044 days)
• Over 50 community adoption groups now look after a stretch of their local waterway
• Nearly 27,500 children discovered their local canal or river as part of the our volunteer-led Canal & River Explorers programme
• Around 10,000 people visited our winter works open days to see the heart of our repair work to keep their local waterway functioning
• Being presented with a cheque for £50k as the People’s Postcode Lottery’s ‘charity of the year’

Tony Hales, chairman of Canal & River Trust, comments:

“The weather has thrown everything at us this year as we’ve had to contend with both water shortage and deluge, reminding us just how much care and attention our historic and fragile infrastructure needs.

Despite this we have been able to hold our own and I am so proud of the way our staff and growing band of volunteers have responded. One of the really exciting changes has been the way so many more people are now involved in running and helping the Trust and I’d like to thank all our employees, volunteers, Friends and all our other financial supporters and partners; and everyone who uses, enjoys and loves the waterways.”

Completing his first year as chief executive, Richard Parry comments:

“My first year with the Trust has been thoroughly exhilarating and enjoyable. I have relished the opportunity to get out and meet the people who care for and enjoy the wonderful canals and rivers we’re responsible for. This year we have honed our long term strategy, which includes building the broad support that is so important for the future of the waterways. We are also putting the customer at the centre of all the work we do, with a great emphasis on being open and involving others in our decision-making.

In financial terms we had a successful year, beating our target for income by over £5m and spending more on additional care of the canals as a result.  As an illustration of our increased focus on listening to our customers we committed around £1m of the extra funds to clearing some of the off-side vegetation that boaters had told us was a priority.

It’s an exciting year ahead. Continued good financial performance means that we will be able to spend more than planned. We have put aside funds for additional vegetation work this autumn, as well as further dredging and maintenance that will directly improve the experience for our customers. We’re doing more to stir interest in the next generation of canal enthusiasts, we have ambitious targets for volunteering and a series of summer open days over the coming weeks to showcase more of our work to the wider community.”

The Canal & River Trust's annual reports and accounts can be downloaded from their website.

In May the first SBA rally was held on Bewl Water in the south east.  5 boats attended plus 20 visitors, as you can see from the photo's the weather was changeable.  Thanks go to Dave Molyneux for organising the event.

Click here to view more photos

Outline planning approval has now been given to a Thames Heritage Museum despite earlier objections.  The site at Beale Park, near Pangbourne in Berkshire will include a boathouse containing the restored historic steam vessels Consuta, Donola and Cygnet.

Further information can be found at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-27856905

http://www.nationalhistoricships.org.uk/news.php/618/thames-heritage-museum-wins-appeal

http://www.consuta.org.uk/workshop/Latest%20News.html

We hope to charter a Thames Passenger Steamer for an SBA outing sailing from Rynnymede or Windsor for an afternoon cruise at a cost of around £40 per person depending on numbers. Date to be confirmed during August or September. Please contact Richard Havard as soon as possible for more information and to register your interest. A date will then be arranged to suit as many interested members as possible.

Phew!  The upgrade worked, now we will be able to add new features. Sorry you couldn't get onto the site today - but it was a great day to have been steaming!

The SBA website will not be available on Saturday June 21st.