Police seek driver who cost charity £100,000 - why not MIB?

[Somewhatfoolish]

Police want to trace the driver of a vehicle that struck and damaged a 250-year-old canal bridge, costing a charity £100,000 to repair.

Why isn't the MIB liable for this? Is it because it theoretically might not have been a motorised vehicle but instead someone taking an elephant for a walk? Or is the MIB actually liable for it and it's just being reported like this to convince the person to hand themselves in?

[ralphrj]

Somewhatfoolish said:

Why isn't the MIB liable for this? Is it because it theoretically might not have been a motorised vehicle but instead someone taking an elephant for a walk? Or is the MIB actually liable for it and it's just being reported like this to convince the person to hand themselves in?

I think the vehicle has to be identified before the MIB would be liable.

[Tommo87]

Somewhatfoolish said:

Police want to trace the driver of a vehicle that struck and damaged a 250-year-old canal bridge, costing a charity £100,000 to repair.

Why isn't the MIB liable for this? Is it because it theoretically might not have been a motorised vehicle but instead someone taking an elephant for a walk? Or is the MIB actually liable for it and it's just being reported like this to convince the person to hand themselves in?

Typically they need to identify the vehicle first, to establish that its covered under the scheme.

Otherwise people could smash up their property with a chunk of painted steel and claim it was hit by an unknown vehicle, so please pay me out.

[Ganglandboss]

The charity is the Canal and River Trust, who are a massive commercial property owner. This is small change to them.

[Type R Tom]

Ganglandboss said:

The charity is the Canal and River Trust, who are a massive commercial property owner. This is small change to them.

Funny, whenever I've dealt with them, they are forever claiming to be skint, same when it was British Waterways.

[martinbiz]

Somewhatfoolish said:

Police want to trace the driver of a vehicle that struck and damaged a 250-year-old canal bridge, costing a charity £100,000 to repair.

Why isn't the MIB liable for this? Is it because it theoretically might not have been a motorised vehicle but instead someone taking an elephant for a walk? Or is the MIB actually liable for it and it's just being reported like this to convince the person to hand themselves in?

Why would it be anything to do with MIB, the assumption until shown otherwise is that the HGV / vehicle will have insurance. People seem to struggle with what the MIB is for and it’s certainly not to pay for repairing a bridge

[Letstryadifferentcareveryyear]

I would like to see the buildup to the £100k

£2k labour for the brickwork
£2k materials
£5k for scaffolding
temporary traffic lights £2k

Whats the rest of it for?

[Sebring440]

Somewhatfoolish said:

Why isn't the MIB liable for this?

I don't think they're liable, but they may be able to find the vehicle.

[Type R Tom]

Letstryadifferentcareveryyear said:

I would like to see the buildup to the £100k

£2k labour for the brickwork
£2k materials
£5k for scaffolding
temporary traffic lights £2k

Whats the rest of it for?

There is a lot of H&S working near water (it was one of the reasons I found them so frustrating), boats are needed in case people fall in, and special training for workmen, for example. Not that it would add up to 100k but surveyors would be another cost

[Haltamer]

How much would it cost to put a fk off metal bollard covered in angry stripes just in front of it on that verge?

[Ganglandboss]

This is the location: https://maps.app.goo.gl/gntZkbSTctUr7Y846

Interestingly, the images available are from August 2009, June 2011, October 2021, August 2022, and March 2023

There is damage in the exact same place on the June 2011 images. Then it is repaired in the October 2021 image (with a clear contrast in the mortar colour around the previously damaged section).

It is damaged again in August 2022, and still damaged in March 2023. The same plastic barrier is in place, and the damage seems identical, with the exception of a few more dislodged bricks.

Then this happened on the 23rd April this year!

It seems to have some bad luck!

[Foss62]

Why would it be the charity who paid as opposed to Highways Authority (= local authority)?
A permanent repair of some sort would be required for road safety reasons and rebuilding what was there would almost certainly be the cheapest fix (and might be the only legal one with regard to listed structures etc.).

[Zilla]

Ganglandboss said:

The charity is the Canal and River Trust, who are a massive commercial property owner. This is small change to them.

Summary of 2022/23 Annual Report & Accounts - Income of £225.1 million

[ferret50]

Did a decent enough job repairing it, though!

Needs a bit of armco to protect it, really.

[Castrol for a knave]

Zilla said:

Ganglandboss said:

The charity is the Canal and River Trust, who are a massive commercial property owner. This is small change to them.

Summary of 2022/23 Annual Report & Accounts - Income of £225.1 million

Net loss before property write downs (15.7m) and for 2022 £7.2m).

Big income, big costs.

They have a huge estate to cover and even allowing for depreciation to be written back in, they operate breakeven at best

[Type R Tom]

Foss62 said:

Why would it be the charity who paid as opposed to Highways Authority (= local authority)?
A permanent repair of some sort would be required for road safety reasons and rebuilding what was there would almost certainly be the cheapest fix (and might be the only legal one with regard to listed structures etc.).

The highway authority will own the surface course but the structure will be the canals

[Somewhatfoolish]

None of these really answered my question conclusively so I've had a little bit of research. If you go to https://www.mib.org.uk/media/580341/2017-untraced-...

Then on page 9 it excludes damage to property from an unidentified vehicle so long as there was no human injury.

So long as I'm interpreting that correctly in context which I'm not 100% confident of (eg is it even the right document? I found it at https://www.mib.org.uk/downloadable-content/ )

[cossy400]

Speaking about why this bridge is a collision hotspot, Mr Bennett said: "It's a popular road. There's a lot of agricultural fields around it and it's a route that does get used by large farm traffic and HGV vehicles.


Seem they are looking for anyone to blame.

Surely a camera can be stuck up, or bollards and armco?

[Gareth79]

Type R Tom said:

Letstryadifferentcareveryyear said:

I would like to see the buildup to the £100k

£2k labour for the brickwork
£2k materials
£5k for scaffolding
temporary traffic lights £2k

Whats the rest of it for?

There is a lot of H&S working near water (it was one of the reasons I found them so frustrating), boats are needed in case people fall in, and special training for workmen, for example. Not that it would add up to 100k but surveyors would be another cost

Also all the bricks had to be removed from the canal (grabber boat), and then cleaned up and sorted for reuse. It's not having a pallet delivered from Jewsons and then slapping them in. I can't find pictures of the scaffolding but I assume it wasn't a job that could be done by a random company.

[MrBogSmith]

cossy400 said:

Speaking about why this bridge is a collision hotspot, Mr Bennett said: "It's a popular road. There's a lot of agricultural fields around it and it's a route that does get used by large farm traffic and HGV vehicles.


Seem they are looking for anyone to blame.

Surely a camera can be stuck up, or bollards and armco?

You still might be on the hook then.