Hey Boaters.

[one wheel]

Are boats really causing a wake problem or is this just more complaining by a few Castanet Forum residents ?

If it's truly a problem then why aren't the RCMP Officers not out on Okanagan Lake patrolling & issuing tickets ?

Is this because it's not enforceable ?

Or is the problem that Kelowna is so short of officers that the patrol boat is only used in emergency situations or on selected weekends ?

[alanjh595]

Are boats really causing a wake problem or is this just more complaining by a few Castanet Forum residents ?

If it's truly a problem then why aren't the RCMP Officers not out on Okanagan Lake patrolling & issuing tickets ?

Is this because it's not enforceable ?

Or is the problem that Kelowna is so short of officers that the patrol boat is only used in emergency situations or on selected weekends ?

OR.....is it that a RCMP boat would also be responsible for creating a wake and shore damages too? Plus, they would have to create a bigger wake in the attempt to catch-up with the offender?

Boaters can be chased down on the lake, or they could just wait until the boat docks or is being loading on the trailer. Just because you don't see a boater get a ticket on the lake, doesn't mean that he won't get one, once docked.

[casey60]

at the beach yesterday Many boaters without life jackets. Did not notice an RCMP boat.

[Sparki55]

but how does this analogy even come close to the same? Trashing someone's home is the same as driving a wave towards someone's beach? I get the wave causes damage but not the same...

Both are willful acts of destruction perpetrated to knowingly and intentionally cause damage to another person's property.
As the poster stated

Creating a wake with a boat is not risking anybody's life. So it's not a big deal."

, so trashing someones place isn't risking anybody's life therefore also not a big deal by the standards the poster established. Clearly the criteria for it being something the poster considers as a problem is that if a life is at risk, not if they knowingly and intentionally cause damage to another person's property.
That poster also stated :

if I had a boat I would do whatever I want as this is a free country

, so why wouldn't that apply to others also doing whatever they want in a free country? Why should the poster be the only one to be able to willing cause damage to another persons property? It is a free country as they stated.

Again, common sense and common courtesy clearly aren't that common any more especially if intentionally causing damage to someone else's property is "not a big deal".

It's illegal to drive to someone's house and burn up the front yard with your vehicle.

It's not illegal to drive your boat as fast as you want as long as you are over 100 ft away from the shore.

Let's make the law 250 ft and see if this helps. Ticket the people that violate it.

Just cuz someone is being an *bleep* and damaging your property legally doesn't mean it is the same to go damage their property illegally.

My neighbor's cats dig in my gardens and poops in them. This doesn't give me the right to go take a dump on their front lawn...

[Sparki55]

at the beach yesterday Many boaters without life jackets. Did not notice an RCMP boat.

Don't need to wear a lifejacket unless you are actively waterskiing/ tubing. There just needs to be enough easily accessible on board for every passenger and the driver.

[casey60]

Ok thanks for the update if that's the rule

[Fancy]

So it's not a big deal. Oh no some erosion around the lake which tends to happen every year at high water mark. Why don't you just prepare for high water mark and the waves that come every year.lol. it's going to happen from Mother Nature so who cares if boats make it happen also. I'm entitled to my opinion and I really could care less what any of you think of it. Most of you people are sheep anyway I'm sorry to say.

Quoting for posterity. Anyone that cares about wildlife care what boats do. Having an opinion is the right of all but doesn't make the opinion right. Calling people names says a lot too.

[Fancy]

Ok thanks for the update if that's the rule

It's the law:

https://www.tc.gc.ca/en/services/marine ... vices.html

[cv23]

It's illegal to drive to someone's house and burn up the front yard with your vehicle.

It's not illegal to drive your boat as fast as you want as long as you are over 100 ft away from the shore.

Someone seems to have forgotten the poster in question said if they had a boat that they would do whatever they wanted and intentionally create a wake to damage someone elses property not because of any legality simply that it wasn't putting anyone's life at risk so no big deal. Where is the common sense, legality or common courtesy in that?
If that poster can do what they want, legal or not, because "It's a free country and no big deal as no one's life is at risk" then why shouldn't we all follow that posters lead and do whatever we want as long as no one's life is at risk?

PS, clearly this most recent poster knows little about boats as if they did they would know that a boat at speed creates a very small wake while boats plowing along, or designed to, are the one's creating the large problem wakes. Some of these boats actually take on hundreds of gallons of water as ballast simply to create as big a wake as possible. Also that a large wake can often travel thousands of yards, if not a mile, on our lake not just a cpl hundred feet.

As a boater who tries to remain conscious of where his boat has been , is and is going I'm glad that many posting here obviously don't actually have boats or operate them as clearly the problems on the lake would be much much worse if they were on it.

[Whyme2]

The only reason we sold our boat was due to the fact of all the jack *bleep*'s out there!

[alanjh595]

Boats the skim the top of the water to obtain that speed, must also accelerate and decelerate.......creating a wake.

[LANDM]

Lol, I'm all for boating being more respectful... but how does this analogy even come close to the same? Trashing someone's home is the same as driving a wave towards someone's beach? I get the wave causes damage but not the same...

... Maybe just get a firehose and strip the dirt our of their gardens ;) ... but seriously don't do that.

The wake can cause severe damage to legal/approved foreshore improvements. This is reality and not something made up and very costly. Yes, the weather can do the same, but the notion that another poster has that he can just do as he feels with total disregard to others is, frankly, pathetic.

Karma catches up to people like that. Hopefully.

[Ken7]

at the beach yesterday Many boaters without life jackets. Did not notice an RCMP boat.

How would you know they were without life jackets? You do not have to have them on, but available..

What does this have to do with wake???

[lesliepaul]

Glad some of the posters on here do not make the laws.........we'd all be in jail.

Nimbyism is alive and well here on so many topics I've lost track.

[69cutlass]

I don't know who needs to hear this but some of you don't understand hydrodynamics. The faster a boat is going the less of it is in the water. Thereby displacing less water which equals a smaller wake. A boat traveling at lower speeds so that it is just below the threshold of being on plane will produce a bigger wake or wave than if it is at full speed.