9walker

Well bear if it 'can be as simple or as complicated as you want to make it', why do you not just nip to Norway and fetch one of these cheap tunnels, then we can open it next weekend with a barbeque & disco.

From information provided at a Community Council meeting in Whalsay on Thursday 22nd. Firstly, our council have no funds to finance such projects, so funding must be sought from central Government. Among other information from this same meeting: The Norwegian Government have a policy to supply tunnels to outlying areas. The Finland Government support its communities requiring sea transport by providing free ferry fares. The UK Government has none of these policies. So the first obstacle of a tunnel quest would be to change Government policy, which will be time consuming, as is any political process, and may not be successful. At a Council meeting in 2010 a clear message was received from Norwegian and UK tunnel experts. If the funds were on the table in front of them, no one would be driving though any tunnels for 10 years. The 10 years of course would start when the funding becomes available. So it will be a very long time to wait for this pipe dream.

The Met Office supplies most other forecasters the information they use to decide on a forecast. I put faith in their own forecast. It is updated hourly as new information is received by them. Many other internet available forecasts update at longer intervals, some daily. http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/forecast/gfz0eeq10n90#?fcTime=1419033600 Another good forecast is Windyty. You can click on any past of the map to find wind speed, pressure, wind at any altitude, so you may view the jetstream to see what the weather is really doing: https://www.windyty.com/?56.146,-3.779,4

If nothing else, the sudden arrival of 100's of readily available homes might bring house prices across Shetland back to reality.

Since I'm being quoted in this thread, here are a few figures worth thinking about in the world of tunneling. The recently opened Hindhead tunnel is 2 double carriageway tunnels, 1.2 miles long. It was estimated to cost £270million in 2004, a few years before construction began in January 2007. It was completed in late 2011. The final cost was £371million. 30,000 vehicles a day use this tunnel. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/southern_counties/5198452.stm http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-14298318 So estimates can be a few £'s short.

Caz in 2010 the fares went up 15% instead of the annual 10%. No more revenue was collected, as this drove more folk not to travel. I cannot speak for the other isles, but Whalsay is rapidly becoming a retirement home. The fares are not actually peanuts as you describe. A daily commuter will pay up to £200 per month in fares alone for their car, which anyone can figure out will go a long way towards renting closer to work on the Mainland. With limited bus services, many have no choice but to use a car for work transport. A tiered system is already in place. Larger vehicles pay more, LGV's up to £68.50 return, Fuel tankers up to £109.00, and plant items up to £159. http://www.shetland.gov.uk/ferries/documents/2012A4FaresSheet.pdf Combined with increasing fuel costs, and the expense and inconvenience the ferries already impose on their lives, all the commuting working youth have been leaving in droves for years. If the numbers sufficiently decrease, one ferry would be able to serve the ageing population all they need. This would only happen in Whalsay, if the ferries were not already full to capacity most every trip, with 20-40 cars parked at each terminal because of costs/inability to get booked/travel. So if a reduction in service is on the cards here, larger car parking facilities will need to be put in place at each side, or more Mainland housing for the people forced to leave.

I was at the council's consultation in Whalsay. Looking at all the proposals printed on multiple sheets of paper, spread across half of the Symbister Hall. One thing sprung to mind. How much has all this cost, how many people were employed doing this, and what lifeline service are they all providing? In the reports I saw very 2 dimensional thinking, which will make only minimal savings, but ultimately have a devastating effect on what is already a totally inadequate service to the Island, soon to be my previous home. The ferry costs doubled between 2001 and 2006. During this time no new ferries were bought, no extra service was supplied, wages and fuel did not increase that much. This was pointed out by ferry staff then when cutbacks were discussed in the name of cutting ferry staff wages. The ever increasing management staff dropped their argument at that time, when they realised the ferrymen knew what was actually driving up the costs. I agree savings need to be made, as all these shore staff have built up something without putting running costs first and foremost, due to lack of proper management from above. There are ferries running in Norway with 2 crew. None of the vessels in Shetland can operate with less than they have, most of them because of their ancient design. I wonder, if these ferries are such a millstone round the council's neck, why the running of them was not quickly handed over to the Scottish office when they offered? That would surely remove all costs from the council. http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2011/12/21/government-offer-of-inter-island-ferry-takeover-unlikely-to-be-welcome-in-isles Maybe this quote from the above report could be the reason:

It seems garages are charging quite extortionate prices for seemingly trivial work nowadays. Also, spares are priced much higher than their actual value, as cars are so much more reliable nowadays. This is the new way manufacturers - of not only cars - make an income. I'd check on the internet to see how cheap the replacement spares can be bought elsewhere, Euro car parts perhaps. Also, ask how much the garage charges per hour. Some will charge for 2 people, at perhaps £40 each or more per hour. I was informed recently that a friend left his car in Aberdeen to have new brake discs & pads fitted all round to a volvo while the family were away on holiday. After their return home, received a bill for the completed work, of over £1000. Most cars nowadays are front wheel drive. The bearings will be sealed units which will require hydraulic pressing out & back in to fit. This can only take place after perhaps timely stripping down of the front suspension. The price could be realistic.

Check my above link to the bbc news story. The 4 lane dual carriageway is put through 2 seperate tunnels, I can only assume with 2 lanes each, unless I am mistaken?

The lunchtime national news today, 14th May 2011, spreads the word that the longest road tunnel currently in the UK has just opened to the public. It was also stated that discussion about it began over 30 years ago, and it is expected to divert 30,000 vehicles a day. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/surrey/8586605.stm It is a dual carriageway, 1.2 miles costing £371million. Presumably tunnels to any of the Shetland islands will only need to be single carriageways. So at these current UK costs, a very rough estimate for a tunnel to Whalsay of 5 odd miles could be deduced thus: If £371million = 1.2 miles of dual carriageway, Therefore £185.5million =1.2miles of single carriageway 1.2 miles x 4 = 4.8 miles 4 x £185.5million = £742million Thats £742million for under 5 miles of single carriageway. I'll happily admit this is a wild stab in the dark at costs, but a quarter of this figure is still almost double the 2010 SIC estimate. And costs will still be rising weekly as fuel etc prices continue to spiral ever higher. Does anyone, young or old, still believe there will be a tunnel dug to Whalsay anytime before they are over retirement age?

Oh dear people I believe you are moving away from the point of this thread. Never fear, I do not believe this will ever become an issue. A tunnel to Whalsay is about as likely to happen as a tunnel to the moon. Certainly in most living islanders lifetimes anyway. The last estimate was early 2010 at a cost of £80 - 112 million. This was before fuel prices begun spiralling out of control, so this estimate will be rising weekly with the price of fuel required to run any machinery used in the digging of tunnels. This was also before a change of government, and the massive cost cutting exercise which they have taken on. Meantime my car, like many other working commuter's, is on its way to the mainland to stay until the Linga returns in April.

Thanks Whalsa, I think I've corrected the link. Maybe the council know exactly whats goin on. Throwing away half a million on a dream of tunnel funding is cheaper than spending 26 million on new piers and ferries. They're no see silly efter aa. Changing the day boat & shift boat has already been considered to save some £1000's of pounds in fuel revenue on the Whalsay service annually. But so far this has been dismissed as the current level of service can only just sustain the place, as is now obvious to anyone trying to book ferries now that the Linga is away. Its becoming obvious that the big game plan is to evacuate the isle of all commuting working population, therefore reducing the need of ferries so regular. The stat figures show that its working.

So the Linga has gone away for its annual refit, which this year includes urgent modifications to bring this vessel up to the current MCA standards to allow the carriage of the full compliment of 100 passengers. This will take a few weeks. During this time there will be very limited booking space on most all crossings. I called to reserve bookings for the next few weeks, which I could get none of for the next 3 weeks. These are all ferries required to take me to work and back, being in the morning or evening. My only alternative is to leave my car on the mainland for the next several weeks until the Linga's glorious return, when things will return to the normal busy schedule, and limited crossings. This situation is destined to continue for a minimum of 10 years from right now, as the 'Norwegian tunnel experts' told our council, that if they had the funding right now, it would be a minimum of 10 years before anyone would be driving through any tunnel. By then the 'Hendra' will be nearly 40 years old and will undoubtably need a new hull welded onto it, like the spare ferry, 'Thora' is currently getting fitted as I type. By then this spare ferry will be nearly 50 years old and its component parts should be of interest to historic engineering enthusiasts. But not to worry, there will soon be no need of any new ferries to Whalsay, If you look at page 32 of Shetland in Statistics below: https://webmail.shetland.gov.uk/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.shetland.gov.uk/documents/SinStatsBinder1.pdf You will see that Whalsay's ferry reached its peak of transport figures in 2007, and is now in a steady decline. Among other facts from shetlands stats, Whalsay's population is aging faster than any other area in Shetland. This can only be due to the working youth leaving the isle, due to the inconvenience forced upon all of the isles' residents in getting on or off the place they once called home. Whalsay is rapidly becoming a retirement home, its a long way now from the booming industrious place of my youth. And the damage done to the community by the silly pier debate - a repeat of what severed the community in the 1950's - cannot be fixed easily. The evidence that nothing has been allowed to fix the ferry problem is a constant reminder. Windmills may come here, but correctly pointed out, the ferries will not transport them. Neither will the roads carry them. The Whalsay roads have been neglected by the council for over 20 years, when the last Whalsay roadmen were made redundant, never to be replaced. Roads are now maintained here by the rain and wind. I believe Gussie would stand a better chance of raising the tunnel funds with his £450k in a casino, rather than asking the heads of governments, given the obvious fragile state of the worlds' economy. So to close, I can only wish him the best of luck. A place I once considered a fine home's future depends on it.

I have been corrected on my last point, as someone has had to plead with the MCA to allow the country's old boats to continue running with passenger saloons below deck beyond their deadline. I wonder how long this shall be allowed for now though considering there was a twelve year warning to replace the boats before the legislation changed. Quite recently the Hendra's car capacity has been reduced, to keep the deck clear for emergency evacuation. This is not the first time this has happened, the Hendra was built in 1982 as an 18 car ferry, but with the size of the average car always growing, it would be difficult to find 18 cars in shetland that would fit on this vessel now. 8 large vans now fill this boat to full capacity. The recent closure of the Whalsay fish factory is going to force ever more people to commute to find work. With already on average 750 daily passenger fares taken on these ferries, getting on or off Whalsay shall become even more difficult for all of the public. Now the MCA are to reduce the passenger capacity on the 'Linga' until bouyancy modifications are done to the vessel. This shall take the Whalsay service back to what it was 10 years ago. I was mate on the ferry then with the unfortunate task of turning people away because the number of passengers was at the limit. I do not envy these mens jobs for the coming months. Like I said in my last post here, the island's residents are about to find themselves worse off before the pier collapses, although I didn't forsee this coming. And now that larger ferries are about to be needed more than ever, and the council have decided to wait until a cash strapped government can supply funding for tunnels instead of replacing the ferries - this effectively means "DO NOTHING" - I see in the Shetland Times (20th August top right of page 5) that councillors are saying, "Lack of capacity on the Whalsay ferries has been a problem for a while". Have they finally realised what the last several years of debate on this subject has been about? The men working on the ferries have known this for many many years, but their hands are tied by the limitations of what vessels they are supplied to do their job with. And they are not allowed to speak to the press or public about the many problems in doing that job most effectively. 2 final points I'd like to make: Before the new Yellsound ferries arrived, there were 3 ferries running daily during the working weekdays on Yellsound to cope with demand, will this happen here with no new ferries on the horizon? I'm sure the costs of the extra service on Yellsound will be archived somewhere. And to the cheap tunnel believers: A tunnel to Whalsay would be the second longest tunnel in the UK next only to the Channel Tunnel, which was dug through soft rock and cost 80% over the original estimate. I'm still in favour of building a ferry terminal at Bonydale to make the crossing less than half the current distance, so the ferries could go twice as often at no extra cost. It would also bring the road 3 miles nearer Whalsay which would make the tunnel shorter and surely cheaper when that pipe dream becomes a reality.

As I have said before, although I am not opposed to fixed links to any of the islands, my concern now is with the seemingly forgotten MCA legislation which changed a few years ago now, about carriage of passengers below deck. Since this change the second Whalsay ferry 'Hendra' was only allowed to operate beyond 2008, if there was a ferry replacement programme in place. This vessel, among others in Shetland with passenger saloons' below deck, are currently running on dispensations from the MCA under the aforementioned condition. During the Whalsay STAG process, 'doing nothing' was not an option because of this. Now that ferry replacement programme has been abandoned, and if no money can be found soon for the fixed links, will the MCA still allow this ageing boat to operate here? Whalsay is considered an open sea crossing in the eyes of the MCA, and because of this comes under tighter scrutiny than other ro-ro ferry services in Shetland. Whalsay residents, and possibly those in the the North Isles may suddenly find themselves a lot worse off than they are at present, long before any of the terminals get the chance to fall into the sea. Time will tell. The ferry certificates and dispensations are updated/renewed annually.