The Watery Wellness Trust Ltd dreams of nothing more than a series of disconnected corporation park ponds for use by anglers, paddleboarders, weekenders and holiday hire companies – with cyclists and joggers using concrete and tarmac paths alongside. London is being “cleansed”.
To use an example – there is wide and longstanding and undisputed evidence that a lot of car accidents could be avoided but drivers just don’t react quickly enough – because they don’t believe what is in front of their eyes; that another vehicle is invading their space, even head-on. Same thing with society in general, and that’s why governments and corporations and even individuals get away with so much; nobody believes what they are seeing, until it’s too late.
A legal challenge to C&RT’s actions is being raised, please tweet, FB-share and/or contribute if you can to the crowd-funder here:
https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/protect-boats-homes/
Many thanks, Ian.
National Bargee Travellers Association - London Branch
On Saturday (17 April) Broxbourne’s Canal was filled with a flotilla of boats, all protesting against Canal and River Trust’s absurd and falsely named new ‘Safety Zones’. The Protest included boaters from all over the London region and beyond, including representatives from Broxbourne’s own Cruising Club. A ‘towpath protest’ of boaters and non boaters followed in their wake, raising awareness of CRTs discriminatory policy changes, and how they threaten people’s livelihoods. Support from the local community was passionate, with many affirming how they love the boats, and see no need to introduce these confusing and unnecessary ‘Safety Zones’.
The NBTA argues that the policy is profoundly ill-conceived, particularly in the context of a housing crisis and a pandemic. They also argue that evacuated canals will turn the towpaths into the danger zones they once were, prior to the growth in the boating population.
“Three-quarters of rowing safety incidents occur between two…
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The Diesel-Electric Elephant Company. 
I wonder if the blackhole at the center of the CRT will even be able to recognize the protest happened much less comprehend it’s very legitimate concerns. I hope so. They do not seem to have the actual ability to recognize the complexity of what they nominally manage. Much less recognize that humans are intrinsically tied to the boats on the waterways.
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From what I’ve seen they are of the “out of sight, out of mind” variety. They’ll happily evict whole (floating, moving, ever-changing) communities and not give a single thought to where those people might have gone, let alone worry that what’s left in their place is so painfully anodyne that it makes even the cyclists and anglers grind their teeth with boredom.
Seventy years ago it was agreed by all in Nuremberg that ‘just following orders’ is not a valid defence – I wonder if perhaps we ought to have included ‘too mentally dull and/or vacuous to realise what we were doing’ to that Code too! JMHO. 😉 I’m sure that there are many bright sparks in the corporate wing of the organisation; although they probably don’t stay there for long…
It’s sad, as always, because the real workers of the organisation, the ones nearer the coal face as they say, are almost universally human and hard-working, pleasant to know and to interact with. The corporate gestalt, however, well… Igor? Fetch me the brain from the big jar labelled A. B. Normal…
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