Tag Archives: chargeable moorings

Article, Local issues, News, Newsletter

Chargeable Moorings Remain Underused, However the Price Has Been Reduced for Winter

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It’s been over a year since Canal and River Trust (CRT) started introducing chargeable moorings as part of their plan to bring down boat numbers in London.

So far only part of the plan to bring in 1.1km of chargeable moorings to London has been implemented but already these changes have had a great impact on boaters who move through these areas of London.

In the CRT’s London Mooring Strategy, the length of chargeable moorings in London could go up to 1.5km in the next year.

CRT claimed to have consulted boaters in 2022 on the need for such moorings but it has not provided the results of this consultation. Notably, their 2022 “Issues & Challenges Report” did not mention a shortage of moorings, instead it highlighted boaters concerns about disrepair and lack of facilities.

Little Venice chargeable moorings in August 2024. Once brimming with life, now desolate.

Chargeable moorings were first introduced here in 2019, but they were priced at £10 to £12 a night. Despite low demand at that price, CRT has significantly raised the price, leading to even more space in central London being wasted, empty of boaters.

According to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted in June 2024, only 1,203 bookings were made between October 2023 and May 2024 (out of a possible 7,224 bookings), indicating that the moorings were used at just 17% capacity.

The FOI revealed that CRT earned a gross income of £36,532 from these bookings on an average of just over £30 per night. We believe this is barely enough to cover the cost of administering prebookable moorings.

The rationale for them is to enable people to book a berth without having to find somewhere to moor on their own in central London. However, the data tells us that the demand is simply not there: only 16.5% of the availability has been utilised.

Rather than improving access to the capital, the charges have effectively priced many existing boaters out of central London, leaving prime locations empty. As a result, many boaters must now cruise for a full day to find a mooring, or risk being fined.

There is a knock-on effect of leaving these locations empty too: those who cannot afford to pay are forced to moor in now even more crowded areas, making a trip through London even more precarious for boaters with or without a home mooring.

Vandalised chargeable mooring sign in London

The situation has also worsened safety concerns for boaters and local residents, as these once-bustling sections of towpath have been deserted, leaving them more vulnerable to crime.

Others may opt for a River Only license, staying on the Lee and Stort as London’s main canal network becomes too expensive, a move that will reduce CRT’s revenue further.

The decimation of London’s boating community and the safety that it brings to the canal here means those boaters from outside London whom CRT are trying to entice with their pricey prebookable moorings are likely to avoid the capital altogether.

A subsequent FOI in October 2024 revealed that three Mooring Rangers, tasked with managing these moorings, cost CRT £104k annually, far exceeding the (assumed) £73k annual income from the moorings. This suggests CRT may even be operating this policy at a loss. It is an illogical policy that is costing boaters and CRT, with no clear benefit to either.

In November 2024, CRT decided to reduce the price of these chargeable moorings – from between £25 and £35 per night to £20 per night – as a result of NBTA London’s campaigning.

We look forward to seeing whether the reduced price has any positive uptick in the number of bookings made, or if there is in fact NO case for charging per night for mooring on the public towpath at all.

Due NBTA London campaigning CRT has also agreed to stop charging to moor in Camden and says they no longer plans to roll out more chargable moorings across London including Uxbridge, Kensal, Broadway Market and Victoria Park. However, CRT has remained committed to charging boaters to be able to moor in Little Venice, Paddington Basin, Kings Cross and Angel.

NBTA believe these mooring spots should be open for anyone boating through London, as is the norm across the entire canal network, and that the privatisation of public spaces should continue to be resisted.

NBTA London needs your support to carry on our work. Please get in touch here if you would like to volunteer with us. Alternatively your donations are vital to us supporting boaters with their legal case work, campaign banners and other printed material as well as events. You can help us with your donations online here

News

Some wins over Chargeable Moorings

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Canal and River Trust (CRT) backs down over some of the chargeable moorings.


Following campaigns from the NBTA London, the CRT have scrapped charges to moor on the Camden visitor moorings, and reduced prices over winter across all chargeable moorings in London. High-profile media coverage the other week – including in The Telegraph – reported that the moorings were “punishingly expensive,” privatising the canals and turning once-busy spots into a “ghost town.”


CRT imposed the charges on sites initially meant to be “eco-moorings”, despite all surveyed groups of waterway users responding negatively to the proposal. Freedom of Information requests by the NBTA showed that existing chargeable moorings were only booked 16.5% of the time during the first six months of the year, making once vibrant stretches of the canal deserted and unsafe. Plans for more charges in Victoria Park, Broadway Market and Cowley are now looking unwise for CRT.
The NBTA London welcomes the roll-back, but won’t stop pushing for an end to discriminatory policies, including scrapping all chargeable moorings and the surcharge on continuous cruiser licences.


If you want to protect a thriving boat community from being pushed off the waterways, take action now and stop the rest of the chargeable mooring.

London, we need your help!
Boats are moored in protest against the chargeable moorings

Article, News, Newsletter

Where have all the boats gone?

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In March, the Canal and River Trust (CRT) announced that they will be introducing 800 meters of new pre-bookable moorings at 6 sites across London: Kings Cross, Camden, Victoria Park, Broadway Market, Kensal Green and Cowley North. This is in addition to existing chargeable moorings at Islington, Little Venice and Paddington.

Since then, members of NBTA London have been working together to campaign against the loss of these free mooring spaces, and to tackle the CRT’s assertions that boaters struggle to find somewhere to moor in London and therefore these pre-bookable moorings are justifiable.

These pre-bookable moorings are now live but if you have been anywhere near these moorings, you’ll be wondering who are the boaters that so desperately want to moor in these spots, because they’re not in London. These moorings, which used to be full of bustling boater life, are now empty and quiet. Locals have already started to comment that they do not feel safe walking these strips of towpath at night again. In response to this, an outreach program targeted at locals and boaters, called “Where have all the boats gone?”, is about to be launched to find out how the lack of boats in these areas is negatively impacting their use of the canal and towpath.

To make matters worse, more chargeable moorings now seem to be popping up, almost over night, with little or no warning. Embarrassingly for CRT, these pre-bookable moorings are clearly already failing. Based on the lack of uptake, the CRT have been sent several FOIs regarding the use of these moorings, but unfortunately they have not been very forthcoming with their responses so far.

Chargeable Mooring Sign in London, subverted by local boaters to read, “No Charges apply”

As many boaters have expressed an interest in continuing to use these moorings as standard, 14 day mooring. Here is guidance regarding the possible implications of mooring in these spots: https://nbtalondon.co.uk/2024/07/12/should-i-moor-on-the-payable-moorings-some-brief-guidance-and-advice/

Let CRT know that you don’t agree with this new change by using their contact form here: https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/contact-us/ways-to-contact-us

Article, Local issues, News, Newsletter

New Chargeable Moorings Across London

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The CRT announced in the Boaters Update 22/03/24 that they are introducing around 800 meters of new pre-bookable moorings across 6 sites in London this year. The new sites are Kings Cross, Camden, Victoria Park, Broadway Market, Kensal Green and Cowley North, which will be joining Islington, Little Venice and Paddington.

These moorings come at a premium of £25-£35 per night and bring the total mooring space at this price to approx 1,500 meters. 1,500 meters would fit around 95 single moored 50 foot boats. This is an attempt to displace boats from the capital, we have seen already that these chargeable moorings mostly sit empty, so there is no justification for making more unless it is indeed an attempt to move boats out of London.

The eco moorings at Kings Cross and Angel are now £35 per night, as of the 1st of April, new sites at Kings Cross and Camden are also now available to book online. The other new sites will be phased in throughout the year. 2024 is looking to be a bad year for boaters at the hands of the CRT, first the surcharge which -if left unchecked- will threaten our whole way of life, and now these chargeable moorings, which will have a direct and very tangible impact on boaters living in and around London in 2024 and beyond.

CRT are saying that it is less than 10% of London’s moorings that are now chargeable, but all except Cowley are in one 10 mile stretch of central London (to add to Little Venice and Paddington) which will make travelling across that stretch without paying increasingly difficult.

NBTA London needs your support to carry on our work. Please get in touch here if you would like to volunteer with us. Alternatively your donations are vital to us supporting boaters with their legal case work, campaign banners and other printed material as well as events. You can help us with your donations online here

Article, Local issues, nbta london, News, Newsletter

Chargeable, Bookable Moorings

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In 2016, prior to launching the London Mooring Strategy, which was published in 2018, CRT and NBTA-London had round-the-table discussions about CRT’s thoughts on “pre-bookable” moorings. NBTA made it explicitly clear that if there were any “pre-bookable” moorings to be created, then they should be on the offside, and that tow-path moorings should never be chargeable.

Instead, CRT proceeded to make use of any vacant offside space not yet used for mooring for “long term”, or “residential” moorings, rather than increasing mooring space for visitors who were willing to book ahead, often making deals with third parties who owned the offside land. Two such set of moorings is at Broadway Market on the Regent, which in particular impedes navigation in what was already a very busy part of the London network, whilst overlooking the opportunity to create “pre-bookable” moorings; the other being Matchmakers on the River Lea, where the installation of those moorings meant CRT with their ‘safety’ zones are trying to enforce a ‘no mooring’ site on the towpath.

Yet, this is taken from CRT’s website:

“It’s really important that navigation is maintained and that it’s not impeded by moored boats. The inner London waterways are very busy with many different types of boater: liveaboard, leisure, freight, and business craft as well as increasing numbers of unpowered craft. This measure is intended to ensure that there is clear navigation for everyone in these busy areas.”

Their policy for safe navigation goes into the ether, however when it comes to the possibility of monetising new moorings, such as those on the offside at Broadway Market on the Regent.

Broadway Market, Regents Canal. Pic by Flickr/@scratch_n_sniff

Seven years following CRT’s first discussions with NBTA, CRT have now taken away several “casual”, “visitor” or towpath moorings, making them “pre-bookable”, and furthermore, have started charging extra. Usually, a CRT licence includes the right to moor on any towpath without extra charge, but CRT are turning 1.1km of London’s regular towpath into new ‘Chargeable’ Moorings that would cost an additional £25 extra a day. CRT’s argument for doing so is to make it ‘fairer’ for past-time and full-time liveaboard boaters alike to have a chance of mooring up in popular parts of the canal network. When we checked the facts behind the manipulated CRT survey on how successful the Paddington Basin chargeable moorings are, a Freedom Of Information Request reveals that these moorings have only been used 25% of the time – the rest of the time they remained empty and unused. 

The latest moorings to be eradicated from public, free-for-all use are in Little Venice and Paddington Basin, but this is just the beginning . 

On reading the T&Cs for what CRT call “pre-bookable”, but are actually chargeable moorings, included in these T&Cs are “planned” eco moorings on the Regent at Kings Cross and on Sweetwater in the Olympic Park on the Lee Navigation, strongly implying that these eco moorings may also become chargeable. NBTA also infer from this that the existing eco moorings on the Regent at Angel may become chargeable too, not just “pre-bookable”.

Aside from being financially exclusive and therefore fundamentally unfair in the first place, the quantity of chargeable moorings is not proportionate to the needs of boat owners. Lots of these bookable, chargeable mooring spaces will either be paid for by boaters who can’t find public towpath mooring since CRT have reduced those spaces, or they will remain empty because people a) can’t afford them, and b) don’t want them. If they remain largely empty,  this may then be a great excuse for CRT to turn them into private moorings – as was the case at Here East moorings on the River Lee.

CRT announce itinerant boat dwellers will pay higher licence fees than others

Just before this newsletter went to press, the Canal and River Trust (CRT) announced that it plans to charge boats without home moorings more than boats with home moorings. 

The implications of this are devastating. CRT will now be able to use boat licence fees as a way of removing the travelling boat dweller community from the waterways. It is more important than ever that we join together as a united community to stop CRT in their tracks. We will be sending round a ballot to all members of the NBTA to ask for your input on what action we take next. If you are not already a member, please sign up now to contribute to this vital decision. We have also organised an online meeting to coordinate our fight back. Please join us on Monday 9th October at 7pm. The access details for the meeting can be found on page 3. We hope to see you all there.

NBTA London needs your support to carry on our work. Please get in touch here if you would like to volunteer with us. Alternatively your donations are vital to us supporting boaters with their legal case work, campaign banners and other printed material as well as events. You can help us with your donations online here

Article, Housing, Local issues, nbta london, News

Gentrification of London waterways: CRT’s chargeable moorings policy will price boaters out

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CRT would like to start charging ‘extra’ for Towpath Moorings. Normally your licence includes the right to moor on any towpath without extra charge. CRT would like to turn 1.1km of London’s regular towpath into new ‘Chargeable’ Moorings that would cost an additional £84 extra a week. Why? Because CRT believes financially excluding people from these moorings will somehow make them ‘fairer’. Boaters who can afford it will be able to reserve themselves a guaranteed mooring space, at the expense of less wealthy Boaters who will find their mooring opportunities significantly reduced.

Proposed chargeable mooring sites along the London Canal Network

In reality this would financially exclude many residential boaters without a home mooring from 1.1km of the mooring space they rely on for their livelihood. Much like every other CRT Policy, this prioritises Leisure Boating over Residential Boating – CRT have no actual adjustments in any of their strategies that actively support itinerant, residential boating. Perhaps there is a question here – do CRT believe that holidays are more important than homes? Most worrying of all, evidence suggests that these new chargeable moorings will often remain empty and unused.

Paddington Basin, one of the chargeable mooring locations. Pic by Nick Sarebi, Flickr

CRT have conducted an online survey about their ‘Chargeable Mooring’ plans – unfortunately their survey is invalid for the following reasons:

CRT’s survey is invalid because it claims a Pilot Chargeable Mooring Scheme they ran was a great success. In fact, it was only used 25% of the time – the rest of the time it remained empty and unused.

CRT’s survey is invalid because it is based on CRT creating new regular towpath moorings – to replace the ones being annexed off for wealthier boaters. A Freedom Of Information Request revealed that CRT does not know where these ‘replacement’ regular moorings will be. Historically CRT have promised many new mooring spaces that have not materialised – so if CRT do not know where these ‘replacement’ moorings will be, effectively they do not exist.

Boaters in 2017 tried to stop the Gasworks offside mooring in Bethnal Green from becoming private ‘paid’ moorings

CRT’s survey is invalid because it initially misinformed participants that only 40 regular towpath moorings would be lost to this ‘Chargeable’ mooring scheme. Due to another Freedom Of Information request they later had to amend these false figures mid-survey to 1.1km. This could amount to 120 regular mooring spaces being lost, so this survey was initially based on a false premise.*

CRT’s survey is invalid because it is filled with coercive questions that force participants to suggestively agree to things they do not. The question ‘How many times a year should you be allowed to moor on a Chargeable Mooring?’ does not allow me to disagree with the whole concept in the first place – one can only hope that CRT does not ‘cherry-pick’ their data.

CRT’s survey is invalid because when it suggests introducing a ‘no widebeam double mooring’ policy it misrepresents the facts. London’s canals are some of the widest in the country. There are many places throughout London’s canals where you can double moor onto a widebeam and leave an enormous amount of space for navigation. The impact of removing this double mooring capacity will be vast. Yet again – the survey is based on a false premise.

Angel is another proposed site for chargeable moorings. Pic by Alan Firkser

So where does that leave us? A poorly constructed, invalid survey about a poorly conceived scheme, based on falsehoods and prejudice. No Equality Impact Assessment to demonstrate how this will affect family/residential/disabled/older/financially disadvantaged boaters (CRT have promised to conduct one – but only once the scheme is effectively a done deal). Then there is the strange assertion that making something financially prohibitive will somehow make it fairer (- for whom?).

It feels like history is repeating itself. Yet another policy aimed at debilitating the Itinerant Boating Community, founded on a swamp of misinformation, without any form of proper consultation – in particular, no consultation with those it will impact the most. Surely in any proposal worth its salt you would conduct an Equality Impact Assessment before presenting it to the general public – otherwise you risk promoting discrimination… unless, of course, that is exactly what you intend to do.

Regents Canal through Central London.

And let’s not lose sight of the door that is being opened – one where CRT can charge whatever it likes, for any towpath mooring, anywhere. This new CRT Policy could in fact be a step-by-step guide on how to make a public asset financially exclusive.

  • * This was calculation assumes boats are 60ft each. The number is higher if you assume boat smaller.

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NBTA London needs your support to carry on our work. Please get in touch here if you would like to volunteer with us. Alternatively your donations are vital to us supporting boaters with their legal case work, campaign banners and other printed material as well as events. You can help us with your donations online here

Join us at our Community Summer event at the end of this month. We are having a picnic at the Walthamstow Marshes on Sunday 26th June 2022 – 12pm start. Click here for more details