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Category: Canal and River Trust
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The Canal & River Trust has announced that headline private and business boat licence fees will rise by 2.5% from 1 April 2020.

As previously announced, in March 2018, following the Trust’s national boat licence consultation, a number of changes will be made to licence fees over five years.

From 1 April 2020, a 2.5% ‘prompt payment’ discount (reduced from 5%) will apply for those who pay on time in full, and a new 2.5% discount will apply for those who manage their payments online including, for the first time, for boaters paying by direct debit.  This means that boaters who may not be able to afford to pay in one lump sum will also be able to benefit from a small discount on the full licence fee.

In addition to the current length-based pricing, from April 2020 the Trust will start the phased introduction of additional pricing bands for boat widths over 2.16m (7ft 1”), as announced in March 2018, with a surcharge of 5% applied until March 2021 (when it will increase to 10%).  This means that boats over 2.16m wide will be subject to an increase in licence fees of 7.6% overall from 1 April 2020.

Read more: CRT Boat Licence costs for 2020-21

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Category: EA and others
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On Tuesday 29th October 2019 I represented NABO at the well-attended meeting of the above Forum which brings together representatives of a wide cross section of users of the Thames, largely through the 8 River User Groups (the RUGs) and representative user groups, together with relevant EA personnel.  Chaired by EA's Thames Waterways Director, Julia Simpson, and the Waterway Manager, Barry Russell, this 5-hour meeting proved to be most valuable and it is clear that the new-look EA is making every effort to consult with to its key river users and so move its navigational responsibilities forward over the next 5 years.

Read more: Meeting of Thames Navigation Users Forum (TNUF)

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Category: EA and others
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On Monday 21st October Mike Rodd represented NABO at the first of a series of workshops run by the EA to get input from users before finalising charging proposals for consultation in spring 2020. The aim of the exercise is to simplify the charging, introduce consistency (where possible) across EA’s waterways and (of special interest to NABO) to look at adopting similar principles uses by other Navigation Authorities.

Read more: EA’s Strategic Review of Navigation Charges Customer Workshop

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Category: NABO Responses
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Network Rail is proposing to upgrade the rail lines to the east of the town of Huddersfield to Westtown (Dewsbury). The scheme is a key part of the Transpennine Route Upgrade, which consists of targeted upgrades to the rail network to increase capacity, improve reliability and accessibility and reduce journey times, both within this corridor and between Manchester, Leeds and York.

The Transpennine Route Upgrade is part of the Great North Rail Project.The scheme is known as East West Rail Western Section Phase 2

The scheme is focused on 13 kilometres of railway between Huddersfield and just west of Dewsbury, most of which is currently dual track. Currently, this dual-track status limits the number of trains that can run between the two towns, with significant operational constraints throughout the scheme.

The intent of the scheme is to upgrade 11.5 kilometres of this stretch of the railway to four tracks. To accommodate the additional tracks, there is a requirement to improve the stations at Huddersfield, Mirfield and Deighton and relocate and rebuild the station at Ravensthorpe. The scope of the scheme also includes full electrification and an upgraded signalling system.

The scope includes a rebuild of the existing bridge over the Huddersfiled Broad Canal, and the rebuild of the exisiting viaduct span over the Aire and Calder navigation and Calder River.

The consultation can be viewed here:

The NABO response is here

As a statutory consultee, NABO is asked to comment on the proposals.