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Continuous cruiser

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Continuous Cruiser (CCer) is a term referring both to a class of license fees for boats used on the inland waterways of the United Kingdom, and to the lifestyle associated with these boats. Specifically, it denotes a boat (often a narrowboat) that has no permanent home mooring.

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[edit] History

Prior to 1995 all boats on the canal system were required to have a permanent base for their boat, known as a home mooring. Some boaters used the system 'continuously', living on their boat as they travel around the country, without the need for a home mooring. A change in the rules, starting in 1995, allowed these boaters to cruise the canal system without meeting the home mooring requirement.

For a given size boat there is currently only one licence fee. For example a 57 ft narrowboat pays £608 whether he is home moored or a CCer. The difference is that when paying for their licence a CCer has to sign a declaration that he will abide by the rules of the CCer as laid down by British Waterways.

[edit] Potential changes

At present (2005) a Continuous Cruiser pays the same license fee to use the waterway as a boater with a home mooring, but it appears this may change soon. British Waterways (BW) has proposed an increase in the cost of the CCer's license to 2.47 times the cost of a normal leisure boaters license. For example, the license fee for a 57 ft narrowboat would increase from £608 to £1501 ($1064 to $2625 at an exchange rate of approx £1 = $1.75). Naturally CCer's are concerned by this proposal.

Leisure boaters currently paying for a home mooring may think this change is only fair. The license fees paid by both CCer's and home moored boaters to British Waterways provides both types of licensees equal access to the canal system, but payment for a home mooring is a separate charge, and can cost many additional thousands of pounds.

Cynics point out that it is common for part of the home mooring fee (which is paid to a mooring provider) to be passed on to British Waterways, so by taking action to either require a home mooring or the proposed higher priced CCer license, BW gives the appearance that it is simply trying to insure that it receives either direct or indirect revenue for mooring related activities, regardless of any other justifications given.

[edit] Official justification

Some people register as Continuous Cruisers as a way to avoid paying for a home mooring. There are rules for CCer's that include requirements that they must be on a progressive journey around the system (or at least a large part of it), never staying in one place more than 14 days. Those who register as a CCer simply to avoid mooring fees will commonly not meet these requirements, but instead spend many weeks, months or even years in the same general area.

CCer's who follow the rules often feel that the "bridge hoppers", as those that abuse the system are commonly called, give CCer a bad name, and do not represent the community as a whole

[edit] Other implications

This issue may reveal a more general social-economic and cultural clash between four types of boaters.

  • Some "CCers" are very poor people in dilapidated boats who moor in isolated areas hoping to avoid the attention of British Waterways. Some (perhaps many) of them have unlicensed boats and thus are not really CCers at all. A more rigourous approach by the authority has greatly reduced the number of unlicensed eyesores, and even licensed boats can be impounded if they are deemed unsafe.
  • The CCers referred to by others as "bridge hoppers" are commonly younger couples or families who need to stay in one area because of work or school commitments: many of them have been attracted to the canal by the perceived low living costs, or because they have seen boats on TV programmes, rather than because of any love of canal cruising. To them, the canal is a slightly more attractive or respectable version of a trailer park.
  • The people who would describe themselves as "genuine" CCers have few permanent land based connections, allowing for a more disconnected and carefree lifestyle. With a love of actually 'travelling' by water, and sufficient money to pay for diesel and to maintain their boats in adequate cruising condition, they are likely to be relatively well-off retirees.
  • Boat owners with paid-for home moorings are often members of a more wealthy class than CCer's. They have both a house and a boat to keep up and may not fully appreciate the positions of the other groups, even though some of them ("Boat Polishers") use their boats mostly as floating weekend cottages, and cruise in a year no further than "Bridge Hoppers" do (it is the fact that "Bridge Hoppers" pay less that they resent).

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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