1996 police procedural audio in four parts, by Nick Fisher. A body is
found by a tour boat going along the Regent's Canal; DSI Julie Enfield
(Imelda Staunton) investigates.
So that's the canal covered; meanwhile the net is the scary
Internet (how could anybody send email from someone else's
address?), and as things go on there's a lot of talk about computers
for the ignorant which perhaps was more needed 25 years ago than it is
now. ("Lawrence, what's 'I.R.C.'?") Alas, Fisher rather relies on this
to provide interest, which leaves the actual criminal plot to take
second place – a pity, because I thought it had potential.
When our heroes talked about finding people who might know the canal
well, I jumped immediately to cyclists using the towpaths – though
that was never mentioned, and I have no idea whether they were open
for that purpose in the 1990s. (They certainly were in 2007.)
This is the last of the five Julie Enfields that I've heard; it's not
the last chronologically, but there's basically no continuity between
them anyway. They never manage to be brilliant, but they have a basic
competence which I've rather enjoyed.
- Posted by Ashley R Pollard at
12:58pm on
06 June 2021
I can attest that I rode on my bike on canal towpaths in 1996. Though I believe at one time you needed a license. I never had one, and never got stopped and asked for one.
- Posted by RogerBW at
01:20pm on
06 June 2021
Thanks!
I now vaguely remember officially having to get some sort of permit in 2007, but by then it was basically just "print off this PDF and fill in your name", no actual registration involved.
I assume Fisher wasn't aware of this possibility, and to be fair I don't suppose most of the target audience would have been either. But of all the Julie Enfields this is the one that's aged least well, and since I wasn't being bedazzled by the wonders of the Internet I found myself getting more picky about other things.
- Posted by Chris Bell at
06:35pm on
06 June 2021
As far as I remember the Regent's Canal towpath was a free-for-all in the 1970s. If I was meant to have a licence nobody ever told me so. It was a pleasanter ride than the Outer Circle for my purposes, which were Park Road to Chalk Farm or thereabouts.
- Posted by Owen Smith at
02:29am on
08 June 2021
I cycled to work daily on the cam towpath from 1987 to 1990 and I was never aware of needing a licence, but then I've never heard of this at all before this blog post. Admittedly the cam is a river not a canal.
- Posted by RogerBW at
09:17am on
08 June 2021
Just in case anyone lands here having searched for this: since towpaths are not a public right of way, British Waterways technically required a permit for cycling, but enforcement was basically nonexistent and people who didn't bother to check may never have known about it. The successor body the Canal & River Trust (from 2012) explicitly does not require a permit.
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