Melbourne boat ramps in Cup Day meltdown
It was a different kind of race on Melbourne Cup Day as more than 100 days of lockdown end for Victorian boatersMelbourne’s network of boat ramps went into meltdown yesterday as thousands of boaters celebrated the end of more than 100 days of severe COVID-19 lockdown by taking to the water.
Reports on social media said queues to launch and retrieve boats over yesterday’s Melbourne Cup Day public holiday stretched for more than a kilometre with a wait of up to two hours just to get a boat on or off the water.
Boat owners complained of other impatient people moving vessels without authority to make room on launching ramp jetties.
Then there was the parking, with cars and trailers spilling out onto regional streets as space inside boat ramp facilities – some capable of accepting up to 250 vehicles – filled beyond capacity, or turned boaters away with “car park full” signs.
A number of the public facilities around Melbourne are independently managed.
Once on the water, videos and images posted to a number of boating and fishing forums showed scores of boats anchored within close proximity of each other at popular locations.
Better Boating Victoria, which has flagged plans to turn some of Melbourne’s now-free boat launching facilities into “super ramps”, was asked for comment. Boatsales.com.au also connected several Melbourne-based fishing clubs for comment.
Limited availability
Melbourne has only four fee-free public boat ramps on the western side of Port Phillip Bay compared with 10 on its eastern fringe.
Under strict COVID-19 control measures that still apply to the greater Melbourne area, boaters are restricted to travelling within a 25-kilometre radius of their home or workplace until at least next week, when travel restrictions are expected to ease altogether.
The current travel restriction – upped from just 5km little more than a week ago – has compounded the problem at boat ramps by severely limiting the launching options for a large part of the city’s population.
Also adding to the pressure was calm conditions on the water, as well as reports of good-size snapper catches from the few people able to venture out on the water once the more severe travel restrictions were lifted.
October normally marks the start of the southern snapper season, with boaters hitting the water to chase big reds, even with the sound of the closing AFL grand final siren still ringing in their ears.
A quick scout around several Melbourne launching ramp car parks today showed most of them almost empty.
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