Tacomasailor
Veteran Member
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?
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?
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