36' Rule for Liveaboard

[Icarus]

Tell the marina that they can keep there berth/mooring and I keep my 10000$ a year mooring fees..simple.
Be happy

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, Sea Story, and Auminer.

[Suijin]

Originally Posted by sailingunity

I've been calling around marinas in Kemah, TX and most of them have some sort of rule on the length, either 35 feet or 40 feet.

I suspect it has to do with trying to avoid tenants who bought the cheapest thing they could find to live on, and maintain it and live in a like manner. You see a lot of that around. Basically small derelict boats with Theo Kaczynski types holed up in them.

Not a fair hating factor I know, but I can’t think of why else a marina would care.

[Lost Horizons]

One time, I considered moving to LA and was checking out a marina in Marina Del Ray. They did have a 36 foot minimum rule for liveaboards and I was entertaining an idea of staying at the marina at least for a while. When I asked them whether I would be able to do in on a 34 foot boat, they said absolutely, and that the 36 foot rule was to rule out undesirable boats. At that time I had an almost new, about a year and a half old Beneteau 34.
Personally, I would not live aboard a smaller boat than 36, particularly if it is a sailboat. Let me rephrase it. I am in a process of ordering a new boat now that I may be living on in a future, and I came to a conclusion that for my needs 36 feet on deck is a lower size limit to be habitable. For most sailboat designs it is more than 36.

[secrabtree]

Originally Posted by Chuck Hawley

I lived aboard an Olson 30 in Sausalito for a number of years and it was never an issue. I think the idea of having "eyes and ears" in the harbor was seen as a positive, plus I was nice to the harbormaster and didn't cause problems.

Limiting someone to a 36' boat sort of reminds me of limiting the right to vote to property owners... While there may be some attempt to control the quality of the electorate by using the property "filter", I suspect it was more generally used to discriminate against classes of people.

Chuck

Chuck - Sam Crabtree here - The limiting of voters to property owners was intended to limit voters to those that had "some skin in the game". There was no income tax and a main source of funds for the operation of government was from property tax. It seemed only right that the people who determined how governmental funds were spent should be the people that provided those funds - the taxpayer. And "the taxpayer" effectively meant the property owner. That idea was long gone when deToquiville (sp?) stated that the death of the American democracy would come when the people realized that they could vote themselves more money. Many think that we are now in that situation.

[cohort]

Minimum boat size is dependent on the marina. Some have the requirement and some don't.

More and more marinas are limiting liveaboards for various reasons. Primarily from my perspective is that since liveaboards tend to always be around, they use more services (showers, pump outs, laundry, parking, etc), and are more vocal about issues they deem sub-par and require extra marina personnel for support (to operate and maintain the services they use). Marinas are finding that the extra charge for liveaboards is not worth the extra hassle. Yes, they could charge more and some are doing so now but many marinas just don't want to deal with the extra work.

[john61ct]

Originally Posted by sailorladd

That would be a ridiculous requirement, and I have stayed in several marinas around the world, and NEVER heard of that.... it's like saying you cannot use our roads with a car with less than a V8 engine, or you cannot be a fireman if you are not a man... lol or banning single handed sailing...marinas are in existence due to boat owners and the revenue they generate, DON'T bite the hand that feeds!!!

Private businesses have the right to be arbitrary.

Liveaboards only accepted with red hulls if they like.

Yes would make as much sense, but. . .

[lituya1617]

The root cause of prejudice against liveaboard boats and the people on them is class prejudice. Like all prejudice, it is foolish and anti-Christian. The rich have always had a vicious disdain for the poor and look for signs of poverty to give themselves an opportunity to show how much better human beings they are than those scum on the little boat over yonder. How sweet it is to look down from the flying bridge of a multi-million dollar yacht on a poor person's little boat that has the temerity to try to enjoy the same ocean as you! The attitude is actually a really bad comment on those who hold it. "My boat is better than your boat" is a childish approach to life that should have been outgrown with grade school.
There are also economic reasons for government and marina owners to shamefully restrict the right to live aboard a boat. Government bureaucrats like the Corp of Engineers always suck up to the rich and adopt their attitudes. It is a type of job security. Marina owners are often the same people who own shoreside rental apartments. In many areas like Sitka, Alaska, pressure on rentals drives prices out of reach for the poor. This pressure can be lessened to the detriment of the landlords if people are allowed to live in the many local harbors. The landlords have repeatedly pushed to outlaw liveaboards or raise the harbor fees to the place where an apartment is cheaper. That is pretty transparent predatory capitalism at work. The problem could be solved: eliminate poverty by sharing the wealth a tiny bit better. Better yet, love your neighbor as yourself.
For those who think their riches make them better persons or better boaters, please consider that your attitude really makes you a worse person.

[Sailmonkey]

Originally Posted by Curtpat

Wow you are so off base here, stereotype lately?

There are many like me who live aboard a small boat that are not rifraf.

My Beneteau 31 cost me $80k and I am a working professional.

At the same time I have seen many lives boards in the 34-45 foot range that belong in the scrap yard. For a marina to limit luvaboards by size is stupid. If a marina doesn’t want to turn into a floating trailer park then raise the rates.

Rant over

Did you actually read my whole post? We are also small boat owners as well and don’t like the rule, but are aware of the driving principal behind it.
It’s not a stereotype, it’s reality.

[hellosailor]

lituya,
Methjinks you mean this prejudice is UN-Christian. If it was antiChristian, then it would only be against Christians living aboard. If it is UNChristian, then the prejudice goes against the precepts generally (or at least theoretically) taught and held among Christians.
But there are some very Christian places, like the UK and western Europe, where liveaboards and canal boats are quite common. So unless you can correlate your theory to one or more particular Christian sects, I think we can leave religion out of this one.
Of course boat people are also part of everyday life in Thailand and Hong Kong and many places in between, where the percentage of Christians in the general population, and the sects and practice vary quite a bit from the ones found in the EU, UK, and US. And then there's Mexico...
Good trick if you can extract the religious data.

[Singularity]

Originally Posted by Curtpat

If a marina doesn’t want to turn into a floating trailer park then raise the rates.

So, if the police do not want people speeding, they should just start each and every drive with a fresh ticket?

The speeders will speed anyway, because that's what speeders do.
The non-speeders incur extra cost with no protection from the speeders despite that pre-drive $$ offering.

So who precisely is helped by raising marina rates??

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by Sailmonkey

Did you actually read my whole post? We are also small boat owners as well and don’t like the rule, but are aware of the driving principal behind it.
It’s not a stereotype, it’s reality.

Maybe length minimums along with liability insurance requirements are a means of maintaining a marina contributors would like to frequent.

[john61ct]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

lituya,
Methjinks you mean this prejudice is UN-Christian.

I believe their point was that **classism** is against the teachings of Christ wrt radical compassion for the poor.

Pretty obvious that, but then few Christians live as Jesus taught.

All religions have similar messages

> Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive. — Dalai Lama

Not really about liveaboards as a group, just snobbery against the poor / disabled ones, the desire to segregate our housing arrangements by wealth.

[mack2465]

Marinas are privately owned businesses they can make any rules they wish. If you wish to dictate the rules go buy a marina.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by lituya1617

The root cause of prejudice against liveaboard boats and the people on them is class prejudice. Like all prejudice, it is foolish and anti-Christian...

Warning Thread drift....

I'm reminded of the parable Christ told about the master who was going away and left money with three servants...
- Two worked diligently and doubled the money. They were praised and rewarded.
- The third squirreled away the money and it earned nothing. He was scolded and thrown out.

Question: Which group of boaters or marina managers is more likely to fit into which category of servant?

Unless you are going to be disingenuous or come up with the statistical outlier, I think we all know who is more likely to fit into each category.

The simple fact is a run down marina full of trashed boats isn't as profitable as a well kept marina full of newer nicely kept boats. It would appear that it would be unchristian to purposely manage a marina so that the owner doesn't earn as much.