Brouhaha On The Broads.

[Vaughan]

This is the title of an article just appeared on the EDP website.

Read it for yourselves, and form your own opinion!

I wondered what had happened to this little gem of BA planning policy but sure enough, we now have the result of an enquiry by a law firm, commissioned by the BA to try and clear their name. Three years later.  They don't say how much this fiasco has cost in legal fees, coming out of our money.

The article ends by simply saying that one member, James Knight, voted against.  Well now, I wonder why?   

What the article doesn't mention is why the BA objected to the new quay being used as moorings.  Some of us with a little memory may recall the underlying reasons for that.

I wonder why this should remind me of the saga of Jenners Basin, all over again?

[Bluebell]

Is it this one?

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjHtaTt5-D8AhXbRUEAHa8KCXsQFnoECBIQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.edp24.co.uk%2Fnews%2F23271013.norfolk-broads-police-ended-involved-planning-row%2F&usg=AOvVaw2d_N5WDMw2LD30pVB4nxao

[ExSurveyor]

"He who pays the piper calls the tune",

Except they use our toll money to pay the piper.

[Vaughan]

In the 2nd paragraph of the article there is a link called extraordinary saga, which will take you back to a much more detailed article of 2021.

Worth reading again - it explains a lot!

[Ray]

Could someone translate all that into plain english?

Bearing in mind that care must be taken with what is written, is there an allegation (unproved) that BA may have acted in bad faith because they themselves were not able to use the location as a 24 hour official mooring?

[Vaughan]

I say, we are treading carefully tonight.

 

 

1 hour ago, Ray said:

themselves were not able to use the location as a 24 hour official mooring?

Perhaps the reason for that, is what might have reminded me of Jenners Basin?

[floydraser]

"A four-year row about whether correct procedures were followed when considering two "minor" planning applications for piling work on a remote riverbank has finally come to an end... with a ruling that there was no significant wrongdoing."

Is it a ruling, or just a report? Whatever it is, the BA doesn't come away from it squeaky clean. A few no, a lot of politicians are going through the same at the moment! 

[Vaughan]

7 hours ago, floydraser said:

Whatever it is, the BA doesn't come away from it squeaky clean.

So perhaps they shouldn't have got into it in the first place?

One can't help wondering why the BA wanted to lease what the article calls  "a remote riverbank" to use as public moorings?  Out in the middle of the New Cut, with a fine panorama of the Haddiscoe flyover and a couple of giant electricity pylons.  30 yards from a busy railway line.  Hardly St Benets Abbey, is it?

Aren't we developing rather short memories?  Don't I seem to recollect that at the roots of this very expensive little spat, lies the planning dept's ingrained hatred of residential boat owners?  Those, yclept "Feral people" by a previous chairperson?

Could that be why they wanted to stop the owners of the bank from renting out private moorings there?

[JanetAnne]

47 minutes ago, Vaughan said:

 

...One can't help wondering why the BA wanted to lease what the article calls  "a remote riverbank" to use as public moorings?  Out in the middle of the New Cut, with a fine panorama of the Haddiscoe flyover and a couple of giant electricity pylons.  30 yards from a busy railway line.  Hardly St Benets Abbey, is it?...

Vaughan, dear chap,

Could you please refrain from making the south sound so wonderfully attractive. Our infrastructure down here just can't cope with the hoards of curious boaters you will entice with such eloquent descriptions of the hidden treasures currently shared by the few this side of that cracken infested and highly dangerous Brendon Water

 

[Vaughan]

If only the Broads Authority had a sense of humour like yours!     

[Meantime]

17 hours ago, Vaughan said:

What the article doesn't mention is why the BA objected to the new quay being used as moorings.  Some of us with a little memory may recall the underlying reasons for that.

I wonder why this should remind me of the saga of Jenners Basin, all over again?

I have absolutely no idea, because it is nothing like the Jenners saga at all.

The land in question is owned by St Olaves Marina. It was repiled and used by the EA or their sub contractors when the original botched bank works were done on both sides of The New Cut. Once this work was finished it was handed back in a rather worn state to the marina, who went back to letting the mooring as annual moorings to berth holders.

The BA were looking to provide additional visitor moorings and enquired about leasing that stretch, in the main because of the bridge, to fulfil their commitment to providing masting and demasting moorings either side of the bridge. Discussions faltered and it never happened and St Olaves Marina continued to rent out the moorings.

Then St Olaves Marina lodged an application that was passed with quite a few conditions attached to dig out a new basin within the marina to provide an extra pontoon full of moorings. This work was completed but a lot of the conditions were overlooked until protracted discussions with the BA took place and the work was finally completed. Some of these items were the additional planting of trees and hedges to screen the marina from some of it's neighbours. The provision of land both before and after the bridge to provide masting and demasting moorings. Eventually a compromise agreement was reached where the marina provided the land and the BA piled and quay headed it. These are the two short stretches just before and after the bridge. 

In the meantime the section of mooring along the New Cut owned by the marina and let as annual moorings had reached the point where they were starting to fall into the river and the EA under its remit to protect the land from flooding put in a planning application to repile that bank again, having already done it once back around 2002 or 2003. It is part of the flood defense for the properties on Haddiscoe Island. Planning was granted, but due to the acrimony between the marina and the BA over past planning issues and delay in implementing planning conditions, the BA granted planning for the new piling on the basis that no mooring was allowed. The second planning application from the marina sought to reinstate this as there had by this stage been a long history of mooring along that bank and all the outstanding planning conditions had been met and the BA by now had it's two masting and demasting moorings.

Both sides are to blame to some extent. The marina for being lax and in some cases taking nearly ten years to meet some of the planning conditions. The BA by being petty and sneakily removing the right to moor along that bank as part of the application from the EA.

All the above can be found and verified if you look hard enough into all the documentation held on the planning system for applications dating all the way back to just after the marina started to be developed.

It isn't and never was another Jenners.

It isn't and never was about residential boating. Which by the way is not allowed in any part of St Olaves Marina as contained within their own mooring terms and conditions. Long term visits are allowed, but all berth holders must have an alternative permanent postal address.