Dear Victor,
Thank you for your superb efforts with narrowboatworld. However I must take slight issue with this statement you made in a recent post There is one thing I must say about the trust and its workers, and that is that they have done their utmost under the most difficult circumstances in the attempt to keep the waterways open.
Yes, the volunteers are excellent and the workers too. Management of CRT though leaves a lot to be desired.
Last week we went on a short cruise but had little choice about where to go mainly due to the drought. We did have to go through Hillmorton locks on both the outward and inward journey. Getting through these lock took two and a half hours and one hour and fifty minutes respectively however. The volunteers there were excellent but the delays were caused by two out of the six locks being closed on the outward leg and three of the six on return. No sign of CRT workers or management though!
[The above picture shows some of the wastage with poetry on lock beams on the Hillmorton locks—Editor.]
As I’m sure you know Hillmorton locks are amongst the busiest in the country. It currently has restricted opening time times and are pretty much the only locks for miles around through which one can cruise for any distance. (Foxton locks only open for a few hours a week, Watford locks the same, Napton flight shut, Atherstone locks shut, Braunston locks restricted etc.) Surely then it is not beyond any decent management to think, oh I don’t know, ‘we must devote resources to Hillmorton and ensure they function to their full capacity’ ? Not a chance with this lot!
As far as I could tell the locks were out of action due to lack of maintenance and there lies the rub. Not the drought and subsequent lack of water, just management negligence. I’m also getting pretty sick of CRT excuses like ‘it’s 250 year old network’ and I’d have a little more sympathy with ‘lack of water’ if 95% of the locks I’ve been through didn’t leak, some, perhaps 20%, very badly.
James Taylor