Promenade - Megathread

[Newsdesk]

7 minutes ago, Non-Believer said:

How brave do volunteers and charities have to be...?

I wouldn’t discount Longworth getting involved with a load of heritage weirdos and setting up some sort of old duffers club to take over running all these. Then he can spend his pension chuffing around the Island benefiting from tens of millions of pounds worth of our investment into his personal retirement project. 

[Gladys]

1 hour ago, Newsdesk said:

I wouldn’t discount Longworth getting involved with a load of heritage weirdos and setting up some sort of old duffers club to take over running all these. Then he can spend his pension chuffing around the Island benefiting from tens of millions of pounds worth of our investment into his personal retirement project. 

Can you crash a horse tram? 

[Kopek]

He'll find a way!!!

Aren't there rules about leaving a Govt role and then taking over a facility?

[Andy Onchan]

11 minutes ago, Gladys said:

Can you crash a horse tram? 

It can certainly be derailed, DOI managed to do that when they tested the 'bends' down by the Villa.  

[alpha-acid]

On 9/25/2022 at 6:33 PM, Kopek said:

Yeah, I seem to remember the top boards were gone in the 60s??? The deck chairs were from Broadway northwards! Were we ever going to continue that deck chair beach? Was it best, cost wise, to let it fail, to save the cost of replacing the  groynes???

No one uses the beach in that manner anymore, as a rate payer, I'd be pretty miffed if long thousands had been spent to keep the beach in it's traditional condition to the now use of no one wants a deck chair on the beach!!!

The same can be said of the childrens playground, as a play facility for children, a chance for parents and their kids to interact,  it's a well worth provision on the rates but if it's just another opportunity for the parents use their phone for social media, why should ratepayers fund that??? Can the WiFi be blocked within the playground???

The Playground has been removed and it's just grass there now, you obviously are not walking on the Prom

[alpha-acid]

You can derail one certainly and the horses bolt occasionally as well

[finlo]

6 hours ago, Andy Onchan said:

It can certainly be derailed, DOI managed to do that when they tested the 'bends' down by the Villa.  

I remember a brewery wagon derailing one when it's wheelnuts caught under the sidestep.

[0bserver]

12 hours ago, finlo said:

I remember a brewery wagon derailing one when it's wheelnuts caught under the sidestep.

They've certainly hit plenty of cars, a few years ago one was almost totalled when it hit the open luggage door of a parked coach.

[snowman]

19 hours ago, Gladys said:

Can you crash a horse tram? 

😁 Of course, especially given that it's either in the middle of the road and could hit wide vehicles or its got to cross traffic 

 

The tram should be on the promenade walkway

Edited September 29, 2022 by snowman

[ellanvannin2010]

42 minutes ago, snowman said:

😁 Of course, especially given that it's either in the middle of the road and could hit wide vehicles or its got to cross traffic 

 

The tram should be on the promenade walkway

It is a lot easier for the tram to be on the tram tracks.

[ellanvannin2010]

On 9/28/2022 at 11:15 AM, Andy Onchan said:

Hurrah... Common sense at last: https://www.manxradio.com/news/isle-of-man-news/charity-and-private-funding-on-the-table-for-horse-trams/

I cba looking back so far but I am pretty sure this was in the original "business" case when taking the trams off DBC. 

[Roger Mexico]

I suspect trying to 'charitise' the trams is an impractical idea that won't happen.  As already noted, we've been here before with the Villa/Gaiety and there were no takers either commercial or volunteer, and that was in more friendly times for such ideas.

To see why times are less friendly, you only have to look at the news.  We've seen Graih announce it was closing, not because of lack of money but because of lack of volunteers and inability to recruit paid staff (any charity-run solution would certainly need some paid staff).  And there are regular announcement that long-standing charities and sports clubs are or are considering closing.  The problem never seem to be money, but lack of people, especially to serve on committees and in responsible roles.

Some of this is self-inflicted by the Government.  Since the AG's Chambers took over control of charities, bureaucracy and red tape has increased and become much more difficult to navigate.  As ever the intention isn't to make things work smoothly, but to provide more work for lawyers.  The excuse is to prevent abuse, but in practice it's about seeing to be doing something which the more serious abuses still thrive in Athol Street.  But the additional paperwork and legal responsibility mean that people are less willing to continue serving running charities and it's much more difficult to recruit new people to take on such positions.

But there are other demographic factors as well.  Charities often rely on the retired and if you increase retirement age (especially for women) then there are fewer years of retirement for people to give.  And younger volunteers are not just a smaller pool at the moment, rising costs and especially rent mean they have less free time and money to contribute and are less able to take up low-paid and stressful charity jobs.

There will be an additional problem with the horse trams.  Most preserved lines run away from other traffic, not through the middle of it.  This leads to all sorts of potential legal and practical problems and clashes of priority.  Even without the increases in red tape, no charity is likely to be willing to take on the responsibility without all sorts of subsidies and legal and financial indemnities.

[Steady Eddie]

5 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

There will be an additional problem with the horse trams.  Most preserved lines run away from other traffic, not through the middle of it.  This leads to all sorts of potential legal and practical problems and clashes of priority.  Even without the increases in red tape, no charity is likely to be willing to take on the responsibility without all sorts of subsidies and legal and financial indemnities.

I agree with you there. They’ve made the potential liabilities of running the tram service a lot higher for any operator with the new layout. That may even be the reason why they no longer want to operate it themselves. When a car takes out a tram full of old biddies at the cross over by the Empress it’s going to be very expensive.

[0bserver]

If they hand them over to another group or company, the transaction needs a clause in it that the trams don't run when the TT course is closed.

[Andy Onchan]

1 hour ago, Roger Mexico said:

I suspect trying to 'charitise' the trams is an impractical idea that won't happen.  As already noted, we've been here before with the Villa/Gaiety and there were no takers either commercial or volunteer, and that was in more friendly times for such ideas.

To see why times are less friendly, you only have to look at the news.  We've seen Graih announce it was closing, not because of lack of money but because of lack of volunteers and inability to recruit paid staff (any charity-run solution would certainly need some paid staff).  And there are regular announcement that long-standing charities and sports clubs are or are considering closing.  The problem never seem to be money, but lack of people, especially to serve on committees and in responsible roles.

Some of this is self-inflicted by the Government.  Since the AG's Chambers took over control of charities, bureaucracy and red tape has increased and become much more difficult to navigate.  As ever the intention isn't to make things work smoothly, but to provide more work for lawyers.  The excuse is to prevent abuse, but in practice it's about seeing to be doing something which the more serious abuses still thrive in Athol Street.  But the additional paperwork and legal responsibility mean that people are less willing to continue serving running charities and it's much more difficult to recruit new people to take on such positions.

But there are other demographic factors as well.  Charities often rely on the retired and if you increase retirement age (especially for women) then there are fewer years of retirement for people to give.  And younger volunteers are not just a smaller pool at the moment, rising costs and especially rent mean they have less free time and money to contribute and are less able to take up low-paid and stressful charity jobs.

There will be an additional problem with the horse trams.  Most preserved lines run away from other traffic, not through the middle of it.  This leads to all sorts of potential legal and practical problems and clashes of priority.  Even without the increases in red tape, no charity is likely to be willing to take on the responsibility without all sorts of subsidies and legal and financial indemnities.

Not sure where the correlation is with the VillaGaiety and heritage transport. They are two entirely different types of operation both with different types of customers and requirements.

And I don't think the Graih announcement as it has been reported is entirely truthful, not from conversations that I have heard anyway.