Well, he can't really be right about both of these points at once, but does offer some insight. If it's "feel-good legislation" that means it does nothing. If it's "getting rid of a kind of boat they don't like", I agree--it has gotten rid of a large number of very load boats--as posted above.

Like so many issues on the lake--it is a small number of insensitive jerks that create the demand for more rules. When your boat can be heard a mile away, or your wake is creating a washing machine effect in a cove because you're circling 20X, you're creating the support for more legislation

I don't think it was loud boats. Exhaust regulation would have done that.
Common property requires them to protect the interests of even the lightest user.
At 150 feet, wouldn't a faster boat create more of a disrupting wake to non-motorized users/etc?

Noise even from a static source would be more of the first regulation.
But I think speed and distance is more about the wake and reaction time.

This is exactly my concern with removing the limit. The lack of experience was obvious on the water last summer. Sure, every summer you have the clueless boat renters but it seemed far worse this last season. I just think the timing for this is bad with that variable in play.



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Speed limit now versus then
 

I was opposed to the speed limit back when the law passed. I never thought it was about safety - it was my understanding that the real culprit in most fatal accidents had been alcohol.

Today, I'm more on-the-fence. I did see a lot more idiots on the lake these past few summers compared to 12-14 years ago. Although, at the same time, I don't recall the recent new wave of boaters going at excessive speeds. My recent experience is that many of these idiots do not know the rules of the road.

Because the one item they think they remember is the speed limit.
Imagine them at a faster pace.

Too many laws.

Just have one law, a "do not be stupid " law, and repeal the dozens of other laws that all come down to stopping folks from being stupid.

You cut someone off, you're stupid, here's your ticket.
You swamp someone, you're stupid, here's your ticket.
You fly through an NWZ, you're stupid, here's your ticket.
You ride on the swim platform, you're stupid, here's your ticket.
You take your dark green/black kayak/canoe way offshore on a Saturday afternoon, you're stupid, here's your ticket.
Etc,,,

And actually, a planning hull when going faster makes LESS wake/erosion than one plowing along. Speed = better. Just don't do it when it would be a stupid thing to do.

sounds like?
 

Without looking it up, isn't that USCG rule 6? Only they use the word "reasonable".

You are correct sir. Been a long time since I dipped a prop in the salty stuff.

Rule 6 - Safe Speed
Every vessel shall at all times proceed at a safe speed so that she can take proper and effective action to avoid collision and be stopped within a distance appropriate to the prevailing circumstances and conditions.

Nice and simple. A lot simpler than RSA's abc123, xyz234, 5.89 and 2.4 but only during certain times if maintaining proper steerage unless the sun is in your eyes 30 mins before sunset. (/sarcasm)

Daytime Speed Limit is 45 mph. You are saying that boats don't plane at that speed?

No, where did you see that? I said faster = less wake.

Actually, the opposite is true. For example, bass boats make a small wake when on
plane. Big cruisers plowing along at slow speeds and wake boats generate very big wakes

When it comes to planing hulls, boat wakes are function of water displacement & mass... the faster a boat goes the less mass is in the water, the less mass in the water, the less energy the wake has to cause damage.

Woodsy

I presume that whether a boat is traveling at 45 mph or at 75 mph it would be roughly on plane and create about the same wake although with a different wave speed... the displacement being roughly the same.

The distance the wave travels, and the speed that it travels, is what allows the second craft to take action to navigate the disruption in the surface.

After a certain speed... the same amount of displacement will occur regardless. It would never get to the point that no mass was in the water.

In the end, I think they will legislate whatever needs to be changed to increase the property values surrounding the lake. It shifts more of the tax burden toward lake properties... and that is supported by the greatest number of constituents.

The recent build-out of certain parcels, along with the faster increase in valuation of certain areas, has help to keep taxation in other parts more suppressed.

You do not understand how planing hulls work... while there will be always be "some" mass in the water, at speed it is a fractional amount of the total boat weight/displacement.

Boats with planing hulls are designed to rise up and glide on top of the water when enough power is supplied. These boats may operate like displacement hulls when at rest or at slow speeds but climb toward the surface of the water as they move faster.

Boats with planing hulls can skim along at high speed, riding almost on top of the water rather than pushing it aside. The faster a planing hull goes in the water.. the less water is displaced by the mass of the boat. The less boat in the water, the less energy the boat wake has.

Think of a flat stone skipping across the top of the water...

Woodsy

About House hearing on speed limit bill
 

What a shame that the sound system used in Representatives Hall was so poor that most of us could not hear/understand the speakers.
Further, did it seem to you that the House Transportation representatives were disengaged . . .didn't want to be there.

I do understand the inverse function of displacement and speed. That is why I question wave speed. A higher wave speed... even if the wave has a lower amplitude... results in a greater conservation of kinetic energy over a specified distance. That is what the scientific studies showed.
The faster boat is displacing less water mass at a higher rate of speed.

Again that is amplitude of the wave...

You are correct in that the faster boat (on plane) is displacing far less water at a higher rate of speed than it would at a slower speed. It is also transferring far less energy to the water.

The planing hull design is where the relationships change. Planing hulls are designed to give little resistance to the water and take advantage of hydrodynamic lifting.

The hydrodynamic lift of the hull design is what changes the wave form of the wake. When on plane there is very little displacement (relative to size & mass) very little drag (mostly the drives) and thus very little energy transferred to the water in the form of a wake. The energy is instead expended as speed.

The wake of boat on plane has very little energy transferred from the hull, so the amplitude is low, wave energy is low, and wake dissipates very quickly.

Woodsy

But it is increasing wave speed.
That is what all the studies that they do is telling them.

They aren't slowing the rate of speed near shore just because they feel like it.

All functions of a wake created by a boat are the result of an energy transfer. This energy transfer is directly related to boat displacement. The amount of energy in a wave depends on its height and wavelength as well as the distance over which it breaks. Given equal wavelengths, a wave with greater amplitude will release more energy when it falls back to sea level than a wave of lesser amplitude. The speed of the waves has little to do with this.

A boat on plane displaces very little water and thus transmits very little energy to the water. The low energy waves dissipate quickly. Assuming the boat on plane maintains 150' off the shoreline (per the law) by the time the wake reaches the shore there is little energy left.

This wave energy discussion is the crux of all the proposed wakeboat rules.

Woodsy

Thanks Woodsy. You did a great job of explaining the wake phenomenon


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You are still not submitting a study to the Legislature with all your credentials to support your findings. The Lake Association is.
Should a court fight ensue at a later date... most lawyers would rather have the credentialed studies on their side.

Blah Blah Blah... our discussion was about wave energy. There are plenty of credible studies that support my findings. I certainly could have posted my links but as you seemed so focused on wave speed the point would have been moot.

Woodsy

Not the ones being presented to the Legislature.
The Legislature is a very large body representing very diverse interests... and many times doing what it can to avoid lawsuits.

So somewhere along the line it determined that a boat should not come near the shore or another object in the water if travelling at more than headway speed.

The other object in the water may be for safety and reaction time - who knows? - but the shore has to be erosion... and that must mean the transmission of kinetic force in some manner.

You would need to present studies to overcome that... especially for legislators that are not focused on Lake Winnipesaukee - unless the bill specifies Lake Winnipesaukee.

For Lake Winnipesaukee, and maybe some other lakes, it should be rather easy... they want the property around the lake - within sight of the lake - to build dramatically in value... as it lowers the relative taxation to the properties not near the lake.

If you can show the safety and erosion risks are lower, then the higher speeds may lead to the property around the lake double or tripling in value - maybe a bit over done... but higher than now. That would lower the amount of property tax that needs to come from the other properties within a municipality, school district, and even the county.

Lol.


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It isn't really funny.
There are many, such as myself, that want to see the lake properties increase in value and be built out... there are others that want to see that build out restrained.
If there is no additional erosion or safety issues by increasing, or doing away with, a limit that is very hard to enforce... it would mean that more boaters may want to be on our local waters.
Those boaters would want direct access rather than the use of a public access that may have limited parking and longer waits.

We could see a build out that might take decades due to material prices transpire quickly. That build out removes pressure on local budgets and keeps our property rate from rising.

But we have always been told that added erosion and loss of safety would result in collapsing property values... something that would shift costs back to us.

"There are many, such as myself, that want to see the lake properties increase in value" Would that be so people in waterfront homeowners can carry the heavy end of the tax burden?

"Shift costs back to us"? So you see the issue as waterfront owners VS non waterfront owners?

First: There are many waterfront property owners who are year round New Hampshire residents. Making an Us VS them self serving argument looks petty.

But more important: New Hampshire has set itself up through it's tax structure to benefit substantially from non resident taxes and the tax revenue supported by the tourist industry. Many,many non residents contribute substantially to the tax base that the state uses, while taking very little in government supported services.

It is counter productive to bite the hand that feeds you.

They are properties.
It doesn't matter to anyone whether the property is occupied by the owner, or how long.

The higher that a sector of property goes within a district, the more that the cost of the budget as a percentage is shifted to that property.

Lakefront and Lake view are currently hot commodities... keeping that going is good for the tax rate when you have budgetary pressures on labor - which makes up much, if not most, of the local budgets.

If someone is willing to pay more for a property because they feel that they can do more of what pleases them... then the value of the property is likely to rise faster than the base... and it will shift the budgetary costs in that direction.

It insures that the housing sector stays strong... and the housing sector, not tourism, is the strongest part of what we have going in the Lakes Region. If we stop building or renovating... we lose jobs, lots of jobs. That improvement of the property makes the property worth more.

This isn't new. It just that currently we have an up cycle that we want to keep going. Some will sell... but that will mean that others are willing to buy.
And after they buy, they tend to renovate which keeps the construction industry busy.

So it isn't an US vs Them. They want the property, and want to build/renovate and we want them to come and purchase the properties and build/renovate. If a higher speed on the lake makes that happen... I don't see that as a bad thing.

We've been told for years that the opposite would happen.

I find it highly, highly doubtful that a higher lake speed (or lower one than what is currently in place for that matter) will have any bearing on the price of waterfront properties.

Balance
 

There has to be a balance. A 2015 Moultonboro watershed study included a build-out report. Water quality metrics were measured for today, for a pre-development era and for build-out based on current regulations. It showed that, at the time there was 26% of land within the study area that could be built on. Build-out would occur between 2039 and 2058, depending on growth rates. A phosphorus level above 8 accelerates aging of the lake. We are already there in the Moultonboro Bay Inlet study area and would add to the aging acceleration if build-out happened. See graphic. Basin 1 is Greens Basin inner basin, Basin 2 is the basin including Evergreen Island and Basin 3 is from Lees Mills to roughly Buzzels Cove. TP is total phosphorus concentration.

Even in today's building craze, too many wavers are granted and many rules to control water runoff are ignored. Restraint is needed because the pressure to build satisfies an immediate need but the impact lags by decades. By the time cyanobacteria blooms keep us out of the water every August, it will be too late for easy corrections.

You don't think some boat owners would choose one over the other?
I would think that someone with a high speed boat, or looking to purchase a high speed boat, would want to own or rent property on a lake that supported that desire.

We started to sell Bonide because it was the first to offer chemical fertilizer that used boron instead (still has phosphorus in the starter)
Moultonboro has a low tax rate... and the family and friends that we have there will say it is because of all the waterfront properties. The high valuation relative to the budget keeps the tax rate low. But in Belknap county, I think Alton has the lowest. The other municipalities are going to go after the tax base were they can.

So even if new structure is not built, but more money is expended into the currently existing structures, it is good for the housing industry and the tax base. It may be short term thinking... but if the same house that sold last year for a million sells this year for more that budgetary inflation, it will affect the tax base overall.

Waterfront and view seem to be in high enough demand that they are more likely to see price appreciation faster than the others. The home owners paying more for those existing properties tend to upgrade.

The pro is usually more of an energy efficient unit (windows/doors/insulation/HVAC upgrade)... the con is that higher priced existing units leads to gentrification.

No I don't, just as the implementation of the speed limit has not had a positive or negative impact on waterfront property.

Well, someone seems to be bringing it to the attention of Rep. Bordes.

That's funny - I thought I read somewhere (maybe it was in an old thread) that the Lake was for the enjoyment and use of all NH residents, not just waterfront landowners. Now getting back to boats and speed limits...

Equal enjoyment.

But all property owners have protection from abutting owners doing or allowing for something that would damage their property.

For the 1.3 million plus residents of NH, many of us are not going to see that lakes or mountains as more than the monetary value to represent to us.

For me, the lake is just what draws the building. I never travel near Lake Winnipesaukee except when going to a property in relation to building.
The value to me is different than the other ''owners'' that may use the lake for other means.

For me, it is like being a shareholder in Facebook, I don't use it... but I like the way the profits move the share price.

One of the Republican Reps on the Transportation Committee has let it be known that he has received 800 emails against the bill to eliminate daytime speed limits on Winni and only 10 in favor. He says that the bill is essentially dead.

That sounds good. Too bad most of the large cruisers that create giant wakes are never anywhere near on plane...hence the issue with their giant wakes.

Speed limits and wakes seems like two completely separate issues. I know I'm a little late to the thread here but why are the two being discussed under the same umbrella?