Marina Etiquette - Phase II

[Tacomasailor]

The prior post about Marina Etiquette and the survey surprised me with some of the responses and results. Here is a question about another aspect of that etiquette that I did not see addressed. I need some guidance about how to address this problem.

Our marina has four gates, 13 docks, and over 650 slips. Our gate provides access to three docks that have about 25 liveaboards and are furthest from the marina office and other rather nice amenities.

Additionally, our gate provides access to quite a few commercial boating operations:

- four charter companies with a total of seven boats (three power and four sailing) one of the boats is certified for 40-passengers

- a sailing school that also uses some of charter boats

- three "Boat Hotels" or B&Bs that provide overnight or weekend rentals to non-boaters who do not take the boats out of the slip

- a sailboat rental company that allows hourly to daily rentals. That company has about 15 boats in their fleet.

- two fishing day boats that take up to six guests out on power boats in the 32' to 36' foot range.

Our dock is used by all the charter boats and two of the Boat Hotels.

As you can imagine; Marina Etiquette is unknown to most of the guests of these businesses and commercial operations. We regularly have or experience:

- midnight drunks
- loud weekend parties
- guests hiding the dock carts near where they find the charter boats
- all the 'secure' auto parking spaces taken by guests
- trash bags left at the food of the ramp
- folks walking up and down the finger piers looking into boats
- bad boat operators crashing into marina boats
- 4 AM fisherman departures in loud offshore boats with excited guests

One of the power boat charters operates out of the slip adjacent to us (finger pier in between) and usually does sunset and evening trips. It is not uncommon to have six non-boaters on the finger pier staring into our boat at cocktail time or dinner time. Then the charter boat returns at 10 PM and the guests are excited, happy, and maybe inebriated after a great trip on the bay. They frequently spend a half hour or so sitting on the boat or standing on the dock discussing their trip and plans for more entertainment.

I know the marina needs to make money, the occupancy rate is below 80%, but is it reasonable for them to expect long term marina tenants to put up with the commercial operations?

How do I approach marina management about this issue? So far, their take on it has been
- it only happens on weekend
- it only happens in the summer
- we need the money
- just ignore it

OH - what to do?

Am I just getting to be a grumpy old liveaboard who wants peace and quiet with no concern for what others want?

 

[markpierce]

See if you can move to a different set of docks away from commercial activity or to another/better marina.

 

[Northern Spy]

A valid complaint and a reasonable request. Have a talk with the manager.

 

[Alaskan Sea-Duction]

Get a group of like minded slip renters and schedule a meeting with the manager and voice your collective concerns. If no action, then move and walk with your money.

 

[eseyoung]

this, to me, sounds like a management issue. If the marina is only 80% full and as big as i picture why not put the commercial slips away from the others?

 

[dimer2]

Were the commercial operations in place when you accepted your slip assignment/signed the lease? Seems to me if it only has an 80% occupancy, getting another slip would be the easiest solution? I know how much I value my peace and quiet so if that wasn't an option I would be moving on.

 

[High Wire]

Asking for another slip is the way to go. Trying to change the behavior of the charter capt/crews is a losing battle. Walk around and pick out a couple suitable empty slips and just ask if you can swap to one of them. If you take the work out of finding a slip for you, its a simple change they can do at their desk on a computer.

 

[Bay Pelican]

Charter boat docks throughout the western world are noisy. Each boat usually has a good size group, many times four couples, they are at the dock on their first and last nights and they party. Its vacation time. This will never change.

 

[rwidman]

............... As you can imagine; Marina Etiquette is unknown to most of the guests of these businesses and commercial operations. We regularly have or experience:

- midnight drunks
- loud weekend parties
- guests hiding the dock carts near where they find the charter boats
- all the 'secure' auto parking spaces taken by guests
- trash bags left at the food of the ramp
- folks walking up and down the finger piers looking into boats
- bad boat operators crashing into marina boats
- 4 AM fisherman departures in loud offshore boats with excited guests............

Sadly, even in our small marina we experience most of the same annoyances. There are no commercial operations but the marina has a large dry stack operation and many of the dry stack boaters do what you describe. They will also pull into any empty slip they find, leaving the person with an annual lease no place to dock. Fortunately this hasn't happened to me but I have had my dock lines removed and hoses taken.

I would like to think there's a solution but basically, some people are just ******** and until it becomes legal to shoot them there's not much that can be done.

edit: I didn't type "********", apparently the word I typed is automatically converted by the forum software. The word I used describes the back end of a donkey, the part under the tail.

 

[Tacomasailor]

Moving to another slip probably won't work because we are in a slip that is two feet shorter than our LOA. Our slip is the largest behind Gate 1 (where all the commercial activity occurs). We would have to move to larger dock behind Gate 2, (where there is no commercial activity), but it would cost us $100/month more.

The only commercial activity behind Gate 1 when we moved our boat here, quite a few years ago, was the sailboat hourly rental business and they only had five boats and they were all two docks away from us. Our dock hand no commercial activity.

 

[CPseudonym]

I know it's not always an option but I'd change marinas and vote with my dollar.

 

[Patemey]

Ask the marina to establish a "loading/unloading area" for the boats that take customers out for fishing trips, day trips, or sunset trips. Have this loading area in a location away from permanent tenants. Basically, these boats cannot pickup or return customers back to their original slip - they must use the loading area.

 

[windmill29130]

Find a new marina.

 

[Wilson]

I run a six pack out of marina cortez in san diego on occasion, not my boat, I'm just the captain. I can understand why live aboards would hate us. Show up 3 am or 10 pm, people are excited and loud, maybe drunk... If a group of people showed up on their cul de sac at 3 am that loud they would call the police ha. The marina has enough open slips they should be planning these things out better, we got booted from a slip a year ago due to the next slip not liking us much. Moved us to a more suitable location, I guess ha. Just another set of people to piss off as there is no suitable loading or unloading dock as someone else had mentioned. Dogs bark, fishermen fish, we can all find something to get pissed off about.... Maybe living on a boat in a marina is not for people who don't like people having fun next to the water. Troll much?

 

[timjet]

Moving to another slip probably won't work because we are in a slip that is two feet shorter than our LOA. Our slip is the largest behind Gate 1 (where all the commercial activity occurs). We would have to move to larger dock behind Gate 2, (where there is no commercial activity), but it would cost us $100/month more.

It sounds like you're saving $100 per mo by putting up with the the commercial activity. Is it worth 100 bucks.

 

[rwidman]

Have you complained about these things to management, especially the noise from the boat next to yours? That's the first thing I would do and if it bothers others I would complain as a group. Can you get the charter boat next to yours moved? Can you move to a quieter slip? Have you talked to the charter boat operator about the noise?

Those are the adult responses. The childish responses are:
Make a bunch of noise yourself. Walk around on your boat naked when the guys customers are around. Pee off the dock. Make a mess of fish guts on the dock near his boat. Leave lines and other things on the dock for the customers to trip over. Hang "Private" signs on your boat and finger pier.

 

[BandB]

Moving to another slip probably won't work because we are in a slip that is two feet shorter than our LOA. Our slip is the largest behind Gate 1 (where all the commercial activity occurs). We would have to move to larger dock behind Gate 2, (where there is no commercial activity), but it would cost us $100/month more.

The only commercial activity behind Gate 1 when we moved our boat here, quite a few years ago, was the sailboat hourly rental business and they only had five boats and they were all two docks away from us. Our dock hand no commercial activity.

As someone above said you have two choices, (1) another slip at the marina, (2) another marina.

Marina management isn't going to change the nature of their business. You have a solution that costs $100/month. A simple solution though. You're longer than the slip you're in anyway.

No amount of talking to management is going to get them to reduce the commercial activity. Generally it pays more than recreational. In most marinas the dock fees are greater. A lot of those guests will buy a little bit at the marina. And if the commercial boats fuel there then a huge benefit to the marina. The previous answers you've been given are basically telling you that it is what it is.