The ramp to the pontoons in Dromineer is now sloping upwards
The water level at Banagher has risen about one metre in the past 35 days.
Dromineer people need to drink more wine
The ghost ship is back
Dromineer sans ivy
Garrykennedy
Garrykennedy from a distance
Miranda in Dromineer
Garrykennedy 1
Fewer boats in WI berths this year, I think
Garrykennedy 2
Posted in Ashore, Built heritage, Charles Wye Williams, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish inland waterways vessels, Restoration and rebuilding, Safety, Scenery, Shannon, Sources, waterways, Waterways management, Weather
Tagged Banagher, boats, Drominer, Garrykennedy, Ireland, Lough Derg, Operations, Shannon, Tipperary, vessels, Waterways Ireland
… is to address, on Sunday night, anyone who watches television but doesn’t have a choice of television channels. There will be a medium term economic strategy too, promising a new and better future for all our people. But as Finfacts says:
… past experience coupled with signals so far, suggest that [the strategy] will be a promotional brochure for an international audience with some questionable claims and omissions. The expected plunge in services exports by as much as €50bn during the time horizon is not likely to be acknowledged.
There is an urgent need for a credible growth strategy that has an unvarnished assessment of the challenges with an honest analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, using data that is free of the outsize impact of the foreign-owned exporting sector.
I wonder whether the strategy will include any sheughs.
Posted in Ashore, Built heritage, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Foreign parts, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Non-waterway, Politics, Restoration and rebuilding, Ulster Canal, Waterways management
Tagged boats, canal, Clones, Clones sheugh, department of arts heritage and the gaeltacht, Erne, Ireland, Lough Derg, Operations, Shannon-Erne Waterway, Ulster Canal, waterways, Waterways Ireland
I wonder why Sinn Féin asks questions when it does. This one [h/t KildareStreet.com] seems to have been asked at a time that the minister might have welcomed.
Sandra McLellan [SF, Cork East]:
To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the position regarding the Ulster Canal restoration project; the steps that must be taken to complete the project; the indicative timeline for the completion of the project; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
Jimmy Deenihan [FG, Kerry North/West Limerick] [the third para is the interesting one]:
As the Deputy will be aware, in July 2007 the North/South Ministerial Council (NSMC) agreed to proceed with the restoration of the section of the Ulster Canal between Clones and Upper Lough Erne. The then Government agreed to cover the full capital costs of the project, which were estimated at that time to be of the order of €35m.
It was always the intention that the Ulster Canal project would be funded from the Waterways Ireland annual allocations, as agreed through the annual estimates processes in this jurisdiction, as well as the deliberations of NSMC in relation to annual budgets. It was a key consideration throughout the process that the Ulster Canal project would be supported by a significant level of projected income from the commercialisation of certain Waterways Ireland assets. However, the economic downturn has had a negative impact on those plans.
I am continuing to explore all possible options to advance this project within the current fiscal constraints. In this regard, I established an Inter-Agency Group on the Ulster Canal to explore ways to advance the project and to examine possible funding options for it, including existing funding streams and the leveraging of funding from other sources. The Inter-Agency Group last met on 9th October and will meet again next week, on 9th December.
In the meantime, the Ulster Canal project is progressing on an incremental basis. Planning approvals have now been received for the project in both jurisdictions. Compulsory Purchase Order land maps are in preparation and consideration is being given to how the construction work and other technical aspects of the project will be structured once the necessary lands have been secured. The timeline for completion of the project will be determined when these preparatory steps have been completed.
I welcome these developments, which, I am sure the Deputy will agree, are a significant milestone for the project.
Hmm. The inter-agency group first met on 20 September 2012 and its second meeting was to take place in May 2013 or thereabouts. Now it’s going much faster, with meetings on 9 October and today, 9 December. Does this suggest that the group has found a pot of gold? Is there any link to the cancellation of SEUPB funding for the Narrow Water project?
And what has been going on in (and around) the North/South Ministerial Council? At its June 2013 meeting the Council approved or noted:
That suggests to me that there was either a major disagreement between the northern and southern ministers or a serious problem that rendered ministers unable to approve the WI budget and business plan until 18 months after the documents were required. Could it be that the northern minister, Carál Ní Chuilín [SF], like other NI politicians, had been looking for something from the waterways sector that hasn’t been delivered so far?
Note also that Jimmy Deenihan said
[…] consideration is being given to how the construction work and other technical aspects of the project will be structured once the necessary lands have been secured.
I understand that the design and construction of the Clones Sheugh was to be put out to tender but I wonder whether keeping the work in house might help WI to meet its increasing wage costs with a declining budget.
Posted in Built heritage, Drainage, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Foreign parts, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish waterways general, Non-waterway, Operations, People, Politics, Restoration and rebuilding, Tourism, Ulster Canal, waterways, Waterways management
Tagged boats, bridge, canal, Carál Ní Chuilín, Clones, department of arts heritage and the gaeltacht, Erne, inter-agency group, Ireland, Jimmy Deenihan, Lough Neagh, North/South Ministerial Council, Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Assembly, Operations, SEUPB, Sinn Fein, Ulster Canal, waterways, Waterways Ireland
Waterways Ireland is currently (I presume) implementing its Corporate Plan 2011–2013 [PDF], which still has a month to run. That plan set out, inter alia, a mission:
Our mission is to provide a high quality recreational environment centred on the inland waterways in our care, for the benefit of our customers.
It also had core values, which is nice, and a vision:
Our long term vision is to create an interrelated waterways network which will provide accessible recreational benefits and opportunities for all.
We wish to create facilities and services which will attract and impress visitors from home and aboard, supporting and encouraging the tourism and recreational industries in Northern Ireland and Ireland and promoting sustainable economic growth across the island of Ireland. We seek to protect and enhance the natural environment in and along our waterways for the enjoyment of future generations.
For the period of this plan we intend to focus on the consolidation, improvement and promotion of existing waterways in order to maximise their use. We will progress toward our long term vision by focusing development on the Ulster Canal.
And it had strategic objectives:
To deliver the benefits and opportunities the waterways can provide across a range of areas, Waterways Ireland has identified 6 strategic objectives which will drive the delivery of our Mission and Vision and the objectives set out in this Corporate Plan. These Strategic Objectives are to:
1. Manage and maintain a reliable and high quality waterways network.
2. Develop and restore the waterways network.
3. Enhance the existing waterways network to widen its appeal to users.
4. Promote increased use of our waterways resource principally for recreational purposes.
5. Assess, manage and develop the assets of Waterways Ireland.
6. Develop an organisation of excellence.
Reading that lot, it seems to me that the focus was inward rather than outward, perhaps more in line with traditional engineering-led waterways management than with the new and exciting marketing-led organisation of the future.
The mission is de haut en bas, with waterways coming before customers, and the first sentence of the vision continues the theme. The second sentence does mention economic affairs, but “supporting and encouraging the tourism and recreational industries” suggests that tourism and recreation are something that other people do, not something that WI does: it does not seem to see itself as part of the “tourism and recreational industries”.
The intro to the strategic objectives is pure management gobbledegook, but the really revealing bit is the list of objectives. The last two are inward-looking, but note the ordering of the first four and what the balance of elements says about the corporate focus: WI is going to
This is what used to be called a sales model: design and build your widgets first; then go and flog them to the punters. There is an alternative approach: start by finding out what the potential punters might want and then design and build your widgets to meet their needs. In reality, of course, you do something in between, because you’re not starting with a blank slate: your factory can make one particular kind of widget, not all possible kinds. And, similarly, WI’s main asset is a collection of waterways, not of (say) amusement parks or bookshops.
But a marketing focus could help an organisation to think about how its widgets are to be used. The result doesn’t have to be as crude as adding the word “solutions” to everything; it can be used to shape how the organisation presents its widgets and to whom it presents them. And, in my view, WI needs to do that because, according to the only reliable (and admittedly inadequate) measure we have, the Shannon traffic figures, waterways usage has been declining for at least ten years. [I know that there are other waterways, and many other types of activities thereon, but I don’t know of any published statistics about the extent of usage.] WI needs to reimagine the waterways.
When Jimmy Deenihan spoke in the Dáil on 16 October 2013, he said:
The [budgetary] provision will enable Waterways Ireland to deliver on its core activities and targets, which include keeping the waterways open for navigation during the main boating season and promoting increased use of the waterways resource for recreational purposes. This expenditure should also assist in developing and promoting the waterways, attracting increased numbers of overseas visitors and stimulating business and regeneration in these areas. Capital funding of almost €4 million will be made available to Waterways Ireland to facilitate the ongoing maintenance and restoration of Ireland’s inland waterways, thereby increasing recreational access along the routes of waterways.
My attention was attracted by the phrase about keeping waterways open “during the main boating season”, which suggests a new, restrictive policy. However, the rest of the list is pretty much in line with the existing objectives. I hope that something more radical will come out of the corporate planning process in which WI tells me it is currently engaged.
By the way, note that there was no mention of either heritage, which was the excuse for nicking the waterways from the OPW, or northsouthery.
Posted in Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Operations, People, Politics, Sources, Tourism, Uncategorized, Water sports activities, waterways, Waterways management
Tagged corporate plan, department of arts heritage and the gaeltacht, Ireland, lakelands, marketing, Operations, strategy, waterways, Waterways Ireland
The likelihood that limitless wealth will result from the construction of the Clones Sheugh was reduced recently with the closure of the cruiser-hire base closest to the Ulster Canal: the Emerald Star (Le Boat) operation at Belturbet.
Perhaps, though, it reflects a wider decline in the hire business rather than disappointment at the delay in the canal’s reconstruction.
Posted in Ashore, Built heritage, Drainage, Economic activities, Engineering and construction, Extant waterways, Foreign parts, Industrial heritage, Ireland, Irish inland waterways vessels, Operations, Politics, Restoration and rebuilding, Shannon, Sources, Tourism, Ulster Canal, Water sports activities, waterways, Waterways management
Tagged Belturbet, boats, bridge, canal, Clones, cruiser, department of arts heritage and the gaeltacht, Emerald Star, Erne, hire boat, Ireland, Le Boat, Lough Neagh, Operations, Shannon, Shannon-Erne Waterway, Ulster Canal, vessels, waterways
Irish waterways history 