Taxpayers to dig for £20M for Liverpool Dock

[Roger Mexico]

1 hour ago, 0bserver said:

Likely because he doesn't want to be hit with a defamation lawsuit... although what they did was massively incompetent, sadly as far as I can see it wasn't illegal. 

You have to pick your battles. 

But whether someone was 'responsible' for a project is a neutral fact - how it turned out may be a matter of opinion, but wasn't discussed in detail.  Robertshaw wasn't abusing them directly, but he still refused to mention their names.   A defamation lawsuit on those grounds would just mean that the workings of how the project went were exposed in full court - this might not be the desired outcome.

[Happier diner]

15 minutes ago, asitis said:

If the tale is correct, it begs the question why Peel Holdings decided it was not a viable proposition but our muppets didn't !

You have answered the question yourself.

[woolley]

4 hours ago, Happier diner said:

Trouble is the decision was made on bad information. I think it was about £20M by then. If you asked the same question at £120M you would probably say Heysham was fine and put a shuttle bus on in summer

Sorry. It was a decision made by idiots, even at £20m. In the beginning it was supposed to cost us nothing. This had disaster written all over it from the start.

[The Voice of Reason]

5 hours ago, woolley said:

Heysham is fine, particularly on the fast craft. Easy motorway access to anywhere, even Liverpool. Be wise to negotiate a contingency arrangement with Holyhead in case the power station at Heysham goes Chernobyl. Liverpool development was always lunacy, particularly if we were paying! Said it from the start.

Sorry no. 
The ins and out of the costs of the Liverpool terminal are a separate issue.

Yes it does seem we have been screwed on this. But a passage to Liverpool is essential for all sorts of reasons, practical, cultural, onward access etc.

The IOM and ( the port of) Liverpool are heavily intertwined.

I would hate to imagine a scenario whereby the Manx boats no longer sail up the Mersey.

Oh,and Heysham is not fine. It’s a shithole

Edited August 3, 2023 by The Voice of Reason
Last paragraph added

[asitis]

22 minutes ago, The Voice of Reason said:

But a passage to Liverpool is essential for all sorts of reasons, practical, cultural, onward access etc.

I'd have to disagree, having just done the route, the centre of Liverpool has become an absolute bastard of a place to get out of, one way systems abound and it was an absolute trial. On the contrary Heysham now has excellent motorway links within a few minutes. Heysham may be a shithole as you suggest but it's a port not a destination. Liverpool was never a necessity, it is a nice to have, but it's cost now means that the nice to haves are going to be frontline services here !

100 million plus ongoing running costs cannot be justified by a nice to have.

 

[woolley]

15 minutes ago, The Voice of Reason said:

Sorry no. 
The ins and out of the costs of the Liverpool terminal are a separate issue.

Yes it does seem we have been screwed on this. But a passage to Liverpool is essential for all sorts of reasons, practical, cultural, onward access etc.

The IOM and ( the port of) Liverpool are heavily intertwined.

I would hate to imagine a scenario whereby the Manx boats no longer sail up the Mersey.

Oh,and Heysham is not fine. It’s a shithole

I'm tempted to say so is Liverpool in many ways, but that's another multifaceted story. Heysham is fine for all practical purposes. I would suggest that the typical Steam Packet passenger is not disembarking out of any love or admiration for either port, so long as they can get away as quickly as possible and onto the motorway to go about their business. Liverpool is not so good in that regard due to the city traffic.

I don't give a monkey's whether the Manx boats sail up the Mersey or not, and certainly don't see anything like this cost as a worthwhile investment. Liverpool was abandoned before in 1985 after the Sealink merger. It's certainly not essential, but given we bet the farm on it then clearly you will have your wish.

[0bserver]

57 minutes ago, The Voice of Reason said:

Oh,and Heysham is not fine. It’s a shithole

Have you seen Liverpool recently?

[Omobono]

40 minutes ago, 0bserver said:

Have you seen Liverpool recently?

and just wait until the liverpool city fathers follow London and introduce environmental taxes for vehicles using the city centre  and you have to pay to get off the boat ,  its being discussed  right now ,  Add this to the £1million  rent plus staffing heat and light  eluded to  by Chris Thomas  who said after 85 years the cost of the terminal would be  recouped , by government ,  you couldn't writhe the script for the comedy or errors , 

[Gladys]

1 hour ago, The Voice of Reason said:

Sorry no. 
The ins and out of the costs of the Liverpool terminal are a separate issue.

Yes it does seem we have been screwed on this. But a passage to Liverpool is essential for all sorts of reasons, practical, cultural, onward access etc.

The IOM and ( the port of) Liverpool are heavily intertwined.

I would hate to imagine a scenario whereby the Manx boats no longer sail up the Mersey.

Oh,and Heysham is not fine. It’s a shithole

A passage to Liverpool is not essential.  A passage to a port on the mainland is (OK, roast me, but I mean that lump of land to the east).  Ideally, and practically, that is likely to be any port on the west coast on the Irish Sea. It is a nice to have. 

At the time, there was much said about people being able to go to football matches (I believe the only sailings to Liverpool with visible security on board are the Saturday sailings), shopping (hardly essential) and medical appointments (planes fly to Liverpool). 

In truth, it is an emotional and historic attachment that really has no real value.  The only reason I would sail to Liverpool is to get to the UK and travel elsewhere.  If I wanted to go to Liverpool for its own sake, I would rather (and usually do) fly.  It would only be for a couple of days, at most, and I would rather spend less of that time travelling then actually there. 

Years ago people would do a day trip to Liverpool (and other Steammie ports), but it was a hard day, mostly spent on a boat rewarded by a couple of hours trekking round Lewis's. 

[ian rush]

The original strategy paper is here. Single port capacity at peak times plus FP preference for Liverpool seem to have been the drivers. The commitment was obviously made prior to IoMSPCo being bought by Treasury but I don’t see that purchase making any difference to the strategy, it just took one commercial player out of the picture and joined up ferry operation, commitment to buy land and public interest in IOM plc via Infrastructure and Treasury. 

https://www.gov.im/media/1354224/report-to-tynwald-july-2016-liverpool-landing-stage-strategic-sea-services-agreement.pdf

 

implementation of strategy is a different thing but cost overruns on these sort of projects seems to be a common failing everywhere. The so called professionals involved in costing and planning etc seem to walk away with their full wheelbarrows whilst the public kicks off at politicians…

[WTF]

8 hours ago, Omobono said:

 Chris Thomas  who said after 85 years the cost of the terminal would be  recouped , 

it will be paid for in 85 years , it will be rubble in 30 if it even lasts that long , 

[The Voice of Reason]

10 hours ago, asitis said:

I'd have to disagree, having just done the route, the centre of Liverpool has become an absolute bastard of a place to get out of, one way systems abound and it was an absolute trial. On the contrary Heysham now has excellent motorway links within a few minutes. Heysham may be a shithole as you suggest but it's a port not a destination. Liverpool was never a necessity, it is a nice to have, but it's cost now means that the nice to haves are going to be frontline services here !

100 million plus ongoing running costs cannot be justified by a nice to have.

 

Yes but you and the others on here favouring Heysham over Liverpool seem to be looking at it purely from a car driver/passenger perspective.

 

[The Voice of Reason]

9 hours ago, Gladys said:

In truth, it is an emotional and historic attachment that really has no real value.  The only reason I would sail to Liverpool is to get to the UK and travel elsewhere.  If I wanted to go to Liverpool for its own sake, I would rather (and usually do) fly.  It would only be for a couple of days, at most, and I would rather spend less of that time travelling then actually there. 

But is that true Glad?
 

For those in Douglas and the North you don’t have the extra time incurred in getting to the airport.

You don’t have to get to the sea terminal as long as to the airport before departure.

On the boat you arrive in the centre of Liverpool. No time lost getting a cab/ bus from the airport.

OK flight times are half an hour, sailing times two and a half hours. But taking the above into consideration it’s doubtful whether any time savings are made by flying.

[asitis]

29 minutes ago, The Voice of Reason said:

Yes but you and the others on here favouring Heysham over Liverpool seem to be looking at it purely from a car driver/passenger perspective.

 

Yes I agree, but laying on decent transport, maybe subsidised as part of the ticket price for foot passengers who want to get to Liverpool, would have been far more common sense than the 100 million plus god knows how much a year !

[The Voice of Reason]

59 minutes ago, asitis said:

Yes I agree, but laying on decent transport, maybe subsidised as part of the ticket price for foot passengers who want to get to Liverpool, would have been far more common sense than the 100 million plus god knows how much a year !

But what would be the rationale for so doing if the boat no longer went to Liverpool?
You could equally make a case for laying on transport say to Manchester or Birmingham