Thorpe St Andrew

[Wussername]

http://www.edp24.co.uk/news/council_outlines_vision_for_thorpe_st_andrew_s_river_green_1_4755779

An interesting vision.

Andrew

[JennyMorgan]

Grrrrrr, visions, I'm growing to absolutely hate that term! Just how much waste and waffle does into developing these often airy-fairy visions? As for the increase in boat traffic, umm, where are they going to moor?

Brilliant, cut down six trees so five more can be planted, I wonder just how much committee & officer time, plus subsequent costs this lot has clocked up? 

Those lost 24 hr mooring? Do i smell a rat?

However, I am pleased to see that the Council is, unlike the one at Norwich, embracing its river front.

[jillR]

how john fox's looked when he lived there and it was at the may gurney yard ...

john fox's, may gurneys old yard river yare mid nineties by jill, on Flickr

[Vaughan]

I have to say I told you so.

I have been saying for months that the closing of access to Thorpe Parish staithe was sinister, and here is the proof. What happened to "commercial use of the Green"? The ferry, run by an ex BA employee, can get away with it, but Hearts Cruisers never could. Now the ferry is going to get its own ticket office as well. How much would it cost a private business to erect and move a historic building in this way, just for a ticket office? And would they get planning? You bet not!

We have a perfectly good War memorial at which the town has held a big parade every  year of my memory. Why do we now need another one, on exactly the same site?

I would say that remembrance is forever, and needs no extra embellishment just because it is now 100 years ago.

[jillR]

3 hours ago, Vaughan said:

Now the ferry is going to get its own ticket office as well.

im wondering what else the ferry man is going to be getting to go with the ticket office.

 

[Oddfellow]

Having experience of operating a ferry and also being initially involved with the first Thorpe Ferry service idea (that still hasn't begun operating), I have a bit more insight to this than some others. 

Firstly, the Town council is a driving force behind this. The ferry itself can never make money. There are simply too few users stacked against too high running costs. I doubt that it could ever break even. Back in the day, the ferry was a rowing boat operated between a long lost landing stage on the Whitlingham bank and a bank down the end of Bungalow Lane. This was before the likes of high river tolls, elf 'n'safety, and so on. Back also in  the day when the A47 was farmland and the need for a ferry was far, far greater than today. 

Someone can prove me wrong, but I reckon that the old ferry would have been lost by the early seventies - possibly long before. 

Some years ago, the Town Council began discussing a ferry service with a local riverside landowner. Progress has been slow and fraught with difficulties. I have been at Thorpe for four years now and throughout all this time, the ferry has been a project that remains on the back burner for a number of reasons that I will not discuss here.

Enter Mark Waklyn,  ex-BA staff and owner / operator of the other ferry. Some may argue that because Mark is ex-BA that some favours have been granted. For example, the ability to operate a commercial service from BA controlled land. If you are unaware, the BA does not allow this; in fact it an get right arsey over it. However, this is not the only exemption. The Horning Ferry was permitted to collect and drop off from Woodbastwick Staithe for years and years and I was allowed to even erect notices there. I don't think that Mark Maklyn has received any special dispensation from the BA at all. In fact, I think that there has been a degree of turning a blind eye as he regularly collects and drops off at the Queen of Icini too – right by the No Mooring signs!

I am aware though that discussions were had about expanding the service from Thorpe River Green to encompass dinghy / canoe hire and that the BA did object to this kind of commercial venture but also tried to use its possible acceptance to duck out of its lease on the site a year or two early – this was rightly rejected by the Council and other parties.

The point is this: the ferry cannot make money. However, with other boat hire/sources of revenue, it might be able to be propped up. The will of the Council is to have a ferry so I suspect (this is purely my opinion) that the council will attempt to move heaven and earth (and John Fox’s house) to achieve what it wants. Whether this is for the good of Thorpe is a matter of conjecture.

[JennyMorgan]

Those of us who know Mark may well remember his public and very cutting, and apt,  criticism of Doctor Packman. Either Dr P is magnanimous in forgiving Mark or Mark has the knowledge and means to go his own way, despite the BA. However my guess is that the BA will be entirely neutral where Mark is concerned, indeed it has to be. Like Andy I very much doubt that the Ferry will ever make a profit as a standalone business but I reckon it's a pretty good retirement project.

[Vaughan]

I do indeed remember Whitlingham ferry, in fact there were two. One was a rowing ferry which connected by a footpath on Whitlingham bend to the footbridge over the railway. This was the course of a Roman road, going up Thunder Lane to a T junction with another Roman road close to the present Sprowston Rd and this entered Norwich at the present site of Pulls Ferry. On the south side it connected with the white house in a cut on the bend, owned by Jack Sursham in my day but it had once been an inn, in the parish of Trowse. This was perhaps one of the oldest ferries on the Broads and can be seen in paintings by the Norwich School of artists.

The other ferry was a "horse" ferry much like those at Surlingham, Buckenham and Horning. This joined Bungalow lane with the south side and was a chain ferry, big enough to take a horse and farm cart. Whitlingham was a substantial village in a farming community, so the ferry would have been important. This was a very long time ago and I have heard that Whitlingham ceased to exist after the Black Death.

Nobby Clark maintained a service in a motor launch in the 50s but I don't remember it operating after the mid 60s, although the stagings were still there on both sides. There was also a cattle swim, about half way along the island, which entered the river at what is now called the Horsewater, beside Point House on the Yarmouth Rd. Before the railway was built, there was a track, to be seen on old maps, which connected this with the Trowse Rd at Crown Point.

So there is no problem, historically, in having a ferry to cross the river in Thorpe! What concerns me is the River Green itself, the rights to its parish staithe and the availability of overnight moorings for pleasure boats. If that is now at risk, this is bad.

 

 

[JennyMorgan]

I read in the EDP (local rag) today that Mark Wakelin is withdrawing his ferry service, blaming the latest toll rise despite projections that his toll will drop a tenner!

[kfurbank]

Mark (assuming it is actually Mark) has made some interesting comments elsewhere about Harbour charges being legally required to be reasonable!!

[JennyMorgan]

3 minutes ago, Jonzo said:

I've always been a bit puzzled by what someone who held a reasonably senior position in the BA was doing dicking about running a Ferry service. Is it just me?

I don't think that it was ever anything other than an early retirement project.

[kfurbank]

Not really, maybe he got fed up with all the politics and fancied a lifestyle change. Work is a big part of your life, you may as well be doing something you enjoy if possible.

[ranworthbreeze]

Just now, kfurbank said:

Not really, maybe he got fed up with all the politics and fancied a lifestyle change. Work is a big part of your life, you may as well be doing something you enjoy if possible.

Well said Keith, maybe Mark just wanted to be on a boat in the fresh air, any boat!

Regards

Alan

[JennyMorgan]

30 minutes ago, kfurbank said:

Mark (assuming it is actually Mark) has made some interesting comments elsewhere about Harbour charges being legally required to be reasonable!!

Mark is eminently well qualified to make such a comment. Some years ago a legal challenge was made in regard to excessive charges to pass through Oulton Broad's Mutford Lock. The challenge was upheld and I wonder if the BA's latest attempt to up the charge and subsequent back-peddling is a result of that?

[JennyMorgan]

So there is not now going to be a ferry so what use will the ticket office have?

http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/news/river_toll_changes_blamed_for_closure_of_thorpe_st_andrew_ferry_service_1_4766498

[brandenjg]

It would probably be used as a place to pay mooring fees once Thorpe council take over the moorings 

Or even have recording equipment installed to spy on Roger and the liveaboards.

Or it could be converted into a nice cover for some bins so boaters can dispose of their rubbish.

Or more likely it would be a big expense with no real use like many of the BA's projects.

Branden

[marshman]

Realistically guys, and with respect to Mark, was the ferry EVER going to be anything other than a play thing! How could it ever make enough money to even pay the diesel bill? Ok perhaps on a sunny Sunday afternoon but any other time???

[marshman]

Oh and those Skippers of the trip boats now have to jump through more than several hoops to get their licence these days I believe they come under MCA rules and they are defo harder than the normal BA licensing!!

[Oddfellow]

Any vessel carrying less than 12 passengerts has to have a skipper with at least an RYA Powerboat Level 2 or equivalent handling certificate. Over 12 passengers and you come under MCA rules which, as Marshman points out, come under MCA rules which I know little of as we always kept the Horning Ferry to 11 plus skipper. (It never got 11 passengers!)

[johnb]

On 11/8/2016 at 7:55 PM, JennyMorgan said:

So there is not now going to be a ferry so what use will the ticket office have?

http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/news/river_toll_changes_blamed_for_closure_of_thorpe_st_andrew_ferry_service_1_4766498

Selling tickets for interactive visits to Yare House? OpportunIties to sit in the CEO's seat, answer an email, play "Blindfold Planning": stick a pin in a map of the Broads and choose whether to close a mooring, close navigation, organise a team building exercise there on 25th December. An opportunity to find obscure foreign organisations to join and a competition to find an area of any country that has least in common with the Norfolk Broads and arrange twinning visits for staff. Highest price tickets enable holders to spend an hour seeking to further the top secret and much denied long term  goals:

1) For BA to become a member of NATO

2) For the hire fleets to become part of the Royal Navy, thus avoiding all tolls, taxes and BSS checks.

I commend my proposal to the forum and BA