Brian from sunny Suffolk wrote:
> Adrian Stott laid this down on his screen :
>>>> Fair enough, but only applicable to "honeypot" sites,
>>> I object to this and is why I would not overnight in Llangollen. If I
>>> want to stay in the marina (hole with water and landing stages no security
>>> like a proper marina) I will happily pay for it, but I object to pay to
>>> moor on the towing path, that IMO is one of the things my licence buys me.
>> And if all the towpath moorings are already occupied when you get
>> there?
>
> That is true of everywhere. Try getting a decent mooring in Birmingham
> late afternoon, or even The Bridge at Napton, anywhere in Braunston. if
> its full, its full and you go somewhere else, if you are in Llangollen
> you have a choice, pay BW £6 and go in the marina or go back to Trevor
> for the night.
> I have no problem with them charging for marina berths with electric
> and water at each pontoon, but not on the towing path.
The big problem as I see it goes like this...
The demand for moorings at any site varies enormously, with the seasons,
with the day of the week, with local events, with the weather. Unless
you have some spectacularly complicated system involving everybody
linked into some sort of computer mediated auction system that works
dynamically[1] you are never going to be able to set the price at
precisely the level that you sell just the right number of moorings.
Sell more moorings than there are, and why bother selling them? - you're
still on first-come-first-served, and have (now very) unhappy people to
refund.
Sell fewer moorings than there are and you might be maximising your
revenue[2] (you're not, if someone would have bought the last for 10p
less than you priced it at), but you're not getting maximum utility -
which has to be a feature here - out of the facility.
[1] - even if it does alter dynamically, what happens when I've bought
my mooring for 20p and settled down at 2pm, and Adrian turns up at 6PM
ready to pay a tenner? Am I cast adrift?
[2] - and that in turn is mad: filling 5 moorings at a tenner each may
get more revenue than 10 at 1 quid each, but it leaves 5 people unable
to moor and 5 spaces empty - that cannot be right.
The problem with the market is that it does require both competition,
and the ability of new supply if demand and willingness to pay are
there. That's often not the case with moorings in towns, for example.
First come first served is not "fair" - it penalises those who for some
bonkers reason actually want to do some cruising (I'm one - I rarely
stop before 6 or 7) but it at least maximises use and - for something
like moorings in a popular location that *has* to be the prime test of
any system.
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