In 2023 I paid $344.51 p/a for my mooring licence. Today I got my renewal, $505 p/a. How does NSW justify this 32% increase?
More signs telling us to be safe. There was a campaign by the BIA back in July when the fees increased. They haven't changed so we're stuck with them this year, but hopefully we'll get a reduction next year.
I got my increased mooring license notice today, exactly the same day as I got an email saying that the programme for grants to support boating is up and running again. I seem to recall reading that a significant amount of the increase in boat rego was going into grants. I have mixed feelings about that; it seems a lot like taking away with one hand and giving with the other, but with the drop on volunteering for clubs and similar organisations, grants also seem to be the only way to create and maintain some of the organisations and infrastructure we want.
The country aquatic association I run has about 500 members across rowing, sailing, fishing and paddlesports. Decades ago some of the club members hand-built their own facilities olde-world style, using timber from trees in their back paddocks and putting it all together standing on top of their utes wearing King Gees and Dunlop Volleys. These days such things are completely out of the picture due to OHS and the drop in volunteering, and our facilities are terrible. I wrote a successful grant application for proper toilets to replace the two old "long drops" and some new showers and containers for training boat storage. Without the grant it's hard to see how we could ever get decent facilities and therefore attract people who want to have a shower without crawling under a clubhouse to turn on a pump sitting at a lean on an old drum and then sometimes sharing the shower with a brown snake. Some of our members work very hard to keep this ancient infrastructure going (the life member regularly grabbed his pole and stirred the ** in the long drops) but they couldn't create new facilities because no one was prepared, or able, to get stuck in like they did in the old days. It's arguably NOT that people don't have cash - the tradie fishos are using electronics no one would have dreamed of back in the day, we have two private schools running rowing programmes and of course in the big cities 100 footers have replaced 70s and TP52s have replaced 40 footers- but a lack of volunteers to raise funds and put time into community projects. Many of the 500 members seem to be very keen to get the new amenities - and precisely two of us have actually done anything to achieve it. Without money being pulled from fees into grants, the sailing and boating world we know may deteriorate dramatically.
It's not the only increase though. I haven't slipped for two years, due to various reasons, and the marina that usually does the slip/antifoul are so busy they no longer send reminders. So, when I called to book in, they said nothing until Feb 2025. Price for a 25 footer in Oct 2022 was $1580. In Feb 2025 it will be $1900. 25% in just over two years. Between 2009 and 2020 it hardly changed and was always around $1400.00.
They also used to charge $20 for a tender, no matter how many they took to your boat, now it's $25 for 1-2 people and double for 3-4, and so on.
When questioned, it's insurance, environmental costs, fuel costs, the list goes on. Its the world we now live in, and because there is no choice but to pay it, or sell up, most will pay whatever it costs.
If you can pay for someone else to paint your boat you must be living in luxury! :-)
I just looked up some prices in my collection of old sailing mags. When the Top Hat was a new design, it looks as if they would have cost roughly two year's median wage to get afloat with gear. That's about $150,000 today - and while the boat would have been new, the lower quality of most of the old gear means that a brand-new Top Hat in those days would probably be inferior to your boat today in almost all respects. That's not allowing for things like modern electronics - when your boat was probably built a GPS receiver seems to have cost about three months wages. These day a far better GPS costs about a day's wages.
I haven't run the sums in the shorter term, but things like the new autopilot we just bought are vastly better than anything you could have got a while ago and they cost less, at least when the rise in incomes is taken into account. So one can say that inflation is a very difficult topic to summarise, especially when so much of the stuff we buy today is incomparably better than anything we could have paid more for yesterday.
If you can find somewhere that will allow you to paint your boat,without the complications of OHSS/Insurance/Environmental Levy,good luck !! .
Also,Marinas/Slips see smaller yachts as a nuisance,as are losing the opportunity of more $ from larger vessels,that will pay them to do the work .
The process has become so fraught/expensive that it is too hard = Bays of abandoned boats .
Unintended Consequences ?
$ 500 p/a is still so so much cheaper than leasing a mooring from a marina & made more insulting when swinging next to private licences that haven't been reallocated
This thread started off with me whinging about the price to rent a 20m x 20m patch of silt on the bottom of a river bed.
I guess in the big picture it's not too bad.
We find a mooring better than a marina. A large cost saving. Also having the mooring in a tidal river with sometimes a 3kts current and swell over the river side bank sand bar at times gives us a an unpleasant rolly night. It's a great inducement to go sailing somewhere else. As a result we sail the boat going places a lot more than if we were in a marina. We also are able to spend our nights in a lot of pristine bays in SNSW that rarely have another boat in them. There are a lot more anchorages between Jervis Bay to Bermigui than Alan Lucas would have you believe, if you watch the weather.
Our local slipway allows boat owners to antifoul and do your own work while only paying for the haul and cradle costs.
If I recall right our early 80s mooring annual fee at Gladevsille west Syd Harbour was $35. Can't buy 500ml of varnish for that now.
Select to expand quoteEastCoastSail said..
This thread started off with me whinging about the price to rent a 20m x 20m patch of silt on the bottom of a river bed.
I guess in the big picture it's not too bad.
We find a mooring better than a marina. A large cost saving. Also having the mooring in a tidal river with sometimes a 3kts current and swell over the river side bank sand bar at times gives us a an unpleasant rolly night. It's a great inducement to go sailing somewhere else. As a result we sail the boat going places a lot more than if we were in a marina. We also are able to spend our nights in a lot of pristine bays in SNSW that rarely have another boat in them. There are a lot more anchorages between Jervis Bay to Bermigui than Alan Lucas would have you believe, if you watch the weather.
Our local slipway allows boat owners to antifoul and do your own work while only paying for the haul and cradle costs.
The Clyde River moorings being rolly? NEVER. 
I loved all those bays we use to anchor in when we had the boat down there. You know you've become used to the south coast when you think one other boat is a crowd, unless it's a friend.
D'Alboras up here in Port Stephens still allow owners to do their own painting and work. The slipway is run by a sailor and he's very good to deal with.
Sounds a lot better attitude than on the Lake ! May make an excursion/excuse and check it out,as off Hobieing at Winda Woppa,on the river/port for a week .
Oyster Cove maybe,but you have to behave ,and access tricky .
In Another Life - Late 80s - slipped/antifouled (Pacific 747 -2ft draft ) at Soldiers Point - Long Gone,and the Slip now a boat trailer park = progress.
+ had mooring off beach there,that you could walk out to . Even then, it was cheaper than the waterfront properties !
Mason
I was doing a regatta at Soldiers Pt when the old management (not the current great guys) tried to slip a cat around 44'. They had big wooden blocks under the hull - but they were just tied down in shopping twine - not even real string!
As they pulled up the cat it fell off the blocks, punching both rudders and both saildrives up through each hull. Last I saw I think they had decided that they couldn't seal the holes enough to float it off so they were going to get a huge crane to derig it, lift it off and truck it away. I suspect the insurance company had a long chat with them after that little issue.
And just to make it clear, the current management there are absolutely top notch.
I rang Oyster a while ago and at 6'+ I was only going to be able to get up the river on very rare tides. The only problem at D'Albora is that you can't sleep on your boat as you have to be out during non-working hours.
Also, there was a Slip at Corlette Point, Port Stephens,that is now the Anchorage . Bought the Pacific 747 there (1988?),when was up for inspection.
So,2 gone in recent times,with the one at Tea Gardens complicated . Oyster Cove is the best long term option,but is isolated,so you need good transport .
Recall Soldiers Point Mooring/Marina exposed/rolly on a high time,when westerlies coming through Cromarty Channel,with a good fetch from Lemon Tree Passage .
Hoping Weather holds for Winda Woppa - have sat in the rain for a week = come home early - as this window looking settled ,as NE set in ?
Last year NSW Transport charged me $295 for registration. This year they want $407! That's a 38% hike in one year. I'd be interested to know where their costs have gone up to warrant such an increase. I'm willing to bet the boat safety officers haven't got a 38% wage increase.
I don't begrudge the contribution to Marine Rescue, but it doesn't say how much that actually is.
