Meridian Yachts

Meridian’s commitment to the concepts of cruisability, livability and functionality are evident in the 341 Sedan. The salon offers living-room-style seating that provides a home-like environment. Its two-tier integrated window system bathe the yacht’s interior with natural light, from salon and galley to staterooms and heads.

The galley is the heart of the yacht, just as the kitchen is to a home, so Meridian has integrated the galley into the salon while maintaining its distinct functional space with state-of-the-art appliances, generous storage and plenty of countertop space.

Other cruiser-friendly amenities include fully equipped entertainment centers with LCD televisions, CD/DVD players and stereo systems, with Sirius® and KVH TracVision satellite systems available.

The two staterooms allow families and couples to cruise together while enjoying privacy, comfort and convenience. There’s plenty of room so that all aboard may enjoy time together and apart.

Its exclusive Total Command® system integrates bow- and stern-thruster operation and throttle control in a single, user-friendly joystick.

The 341 offers underwater exhaust; the most reliable, best-performing power systems available; and sophisticated fabrics packages that enhance the yacht’s inviting atmosphere.

Experience for yourself why Meridian Yachts is the best-selling brand of bridge boats in America.

341 Sedan

This big cruising yacht in an efficient midsize package boasts a sleek profile and nimble performance.

The salon offers living-room-style seating with an L-shaped lounge with double incliners, and its two-tier integrated window system provides unbroken views of the horizon. The salon space includes a bottle-storage cabinet, an adjustable-height dining table and an entertainment center with 20-inch LCD TV, AM/FM radio, CD/DVD player, Sirius® satellite radio, four speakers and salon and bridge remote control.

The galley has been designed to be part of the salon living space and features solid cherry-wood cabinetry, an AC/DC refrigerator/freezer, a recessed electric glass cooktop with two burners and cover, a microwave, custom countertops and mahogany flooring.

The two-stateroom floor plan easily accommodates families or a second cruising couple. The forward master accommodations feature cherry wood, a large double berth with pillowtop mattress, two illuminated hanging lockers, reading lights and ample storage.

The guest stateroom features cherry wood with gloss finish, a double berth with pillowtop mattress, hanging locker and access to additional below-deck storage.

The head features a cherry-wood vanity cabinet, separate stall shower and full-standing headroom.

The flybridge and bridge helm station incorporate an adjustable captain’s chair, L-shaped lounge seating, Bimini top, tilt steering, flush-mounted compass, VHF and depth sounder. Instrumentation also includes Meridian’s D.O.C.® (Docking On Command®) system, which integrates bow- and stern-thruster operation from a single, user-friendly control.

For additional cruising safety and convenience, the flybridge has a companionway hatch and wide molded-in stairs to the cockpit.

A two-year manufacturer’s Express Limited Warranty on all systems and components not covered by other warranties is offered on all Meridians. Meridian also offers five years of blister protection and 10 years of hull and deck protection on all its models.

391 Sedan

The 391 Sedan seamlessly blends performance and styling with cruisability.

The cherry-wood salon, with its 360-degree views, incorporates a leather double incliner, adjustable telescoping solid-cherry table, raised dining area and an entertainment center with 20-inch LCD TV, AM/FM radio, CD/DVD player, Sirius® satellite radio, four speakers and salon and bridge remote.

Integrated into this living space is a galley, which features solid-cherry construction, mahogany flooring, double sink, AC/DC refrigerator/freezer, two-burner electric glass cooktop, convection oven/microwave, custom countertops and a lighted corner cabinet with carousel. A full lower helm station is also available.

There are two large staterooms and separate shower and head compartments. Located forward, the master accommodations provide an island double berth with pillowtop mattress, custom countertops, two hanging lockers and reading lights. The guest accommodations, located amidships, feature an island double berth with pillowtop mattress, hanging locker with light, courtesy reading lights, stand-up dressing area and plenty of storage.

To port is a head and a separate shower compartment across the companionway to starboard. The head has a mirrored medicine cabinet and a cherry vanity cabinet with molded sink and storage underneath.

On the flybridge deck, there’s an adjustable captain’s chair with flip-up bolster, L-shaped lounge seating, Bimini top, wood-grain dash panel, flush-mounted compass, VHF and depth sounder, and Meridian’s Total Command® system, which integrates bow- and stern-thruster operation and throttle control in a single joystick.

Other touches include the flybridge overhang, which ensures additional topside room; a stairway hatch in the cockpit and hinged, molded-in steps that provide stand-up access to the engine room; and generator access hatches that accommodate routine service.

The flybridge has a companionway hatch and wide molded-in stairs to the cockpit. Like the rest of the 2009 Meridian fleet, the 391 offers standard underwater exhaust; the best-performing power systems available; and sophisticated fabrics packages.

441 Sedan Bridge

The 441 Sedan Bridge is a natural evolution of Meridian’s popular 411 Sedan.

Sporting a new hull, deck, bridge and shearline, the 441 has more aggressive profile lines than its predecessor.

The full-beam salon incorporates opposing seating, creating a living-room-style environment for entertaining or relaxing. It also boasts a dry bar, new ceiling detail with Ultra-Flow comfort air system and a deluxe home theater system.

The wide-open floor plan creates unbroken lines of sight between the salon, the yacht’s dedicated dinette and the full-service galley, which includes a full-size, dual-voltage refrigerator/freezer, three-burner cooktop and built-in convection microwave. The integrated two-tier window system ensures improved visibility from all these interior areas.

Its two-stateroom, two-head layout provides a gracious master suite, located forward, with a queen-size island berth, innerspring pillowtop mattress, two cedar-lined hanging lockers, reading lights, TV/DVD entertainment system and private en-suite head facilities. The amidship guest stateroom, which spans the yacht’s 14-foot, 2-inch beam, features a double berth, full-size hanging locker, vanity and settee, TV/DVD and plenty of storage.

On the bridge deck is a standard wet bar, a multiple-use table and a sun lounge that can be easily stowed beneath the bridge deck’s L-shaped seating.

The ergonomically designed helm accommodates two 12-inch monitors, two 4-in-1 gauges and two 5-inch tachometers. It also provides convenient hinged access for servicing. Other touches include a bridge-to-cockpit companionway hatch, wide molded-in steps to the cockpit, stand-up access to the engine room from the cockpit, electrical panels located at eye level and standard underwater exhaust.

The 441 offers standard 5.91 380-horsepower Cummins QSB V-Drives, while T 425-horsepower and T 480-horsepower Cummins QSB V-Drives are available.

The Total Command™ Integrated Vessel Control System is a low-speed, close-quarters operation system that fully integrates control of the yacht’s thrusters, transmissions and engines with a single joystick. It also provides for independent actuation of bow and stern thrusters via a switch pad.

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Great Lakes Boating Study?

By Ted McDermott

It may seem irrelevant to you, a matter better left to policy makers and activists, but a recently released study of recreational boating on the Great Lakes could have a large and direct impact on the basic, everyday way that you boat.

Does your home harbor need dredging? Are your cruising grounds polluted? Are local fish populations declining? Is the price of a new vessel out of reach due to taxes? Are the docks at your local marina deteriorating? If your answer to any of these questions is “yes,” or if you feel in general that your interests as a boater are being ignored in favor of those of commercial shipping and environmentalists, then the “Great Lakes Recreational Boating Main Report,” as it is officially called, is of grave importance. Its findings could decide the fate of our pastime.

So what did the report, which was released at the end of last year, find? In short, it concluded that an “average of 911,000 boaters visit the Great Lakes annually” and that they support 60,000 jobs and have an estimated annual economic impact of $9.4 billion. Upon first glance, that seems like a lot. But when one compares these figures to those released on July 11, 2007 by the Great Lakes Commission (GLC) as part of a “summary report,” the official data makes boating look relatively minor.

The summary report found that “the 4.3 million recreational boaters registered in the eight Great Lakes states generate nearly $16 billion in spending on boats and boating activities in a single year” and that this “spending directly supports 107,000 jobs.”

So, what accounts for the huge discrepancy? What changed so significantly and quickly to account for a loss of approximately 3.4 million boaters, 47,000 jobs and more than $6 billion?

According to Terry Long of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACE), “As the project goes through different levels of review, we had comments that came out of that review and so we made adjustments based on those comments and that differed obviously from what the GLC had.”

The changes, says Long, resulted not from new data but from how the region was defined.

“Are you looking at the entire state border to border, or are you looking at the region along the lake? That’s where the discrepancy came. We said, ‘The guy on the west side of [Wisconsin] isn’t going to drive across the state to put his boat in on Lake Michigan.’ It became a question of how the basin or the state was defined. . . . Rather than account for the entire state, only the watershed area would count.”

So whereas the GLC draft report used data sets that included the Mississippi River, Long Island Sound, interior lakes and other bodies of water beyond the Great Lakes, the ACE counted only the use of Great Lakes shallow draft harbors.

Despite this explanation, some are questioning the validity of the study, which has traveled a long and rocky road on its way to final completion. It was commissioned 10 years ago, as part of the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 1999, which authorized the “Great Lakes Boating Study” and mandated that it be completed “no later than 18 months after August 17, 1999.” The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, through its Detroit District, was charged with allocating the funds to conduct the study. ACE, in turn, contracted with the Great Lakes Commission to produce it. Why?

“At the time, back in 1999,” said Long, “it was with our understanding that the GLC had a lot of contacts in the Great Lakes area. We thought it would be advantageous to bring them in to do the research. It was more an efficiency thing. They had a more broad overall access to groups. They dealt with a lot of boating groups and companies that we don’t have access to readily. The thought process at the time was that they would do some of the work for us.”






According to Long, the first monies for the study weren’t allocated until 2002, when $208,400 was given. During the first year of funding, $57,522.58 was expended. The next year, another $125,463.73 was spent. In 2004, the year the GLC gathered the data, a further $220,413.69 was allocated. And another $39,947.93 was allocated over the next three years, bringing the total cost of the study to $443,347.93.

The delay in starting the study was due to the fact that funds were not allocated until 2002, making it impossible for the ACE to meet the bill’s deadline, according to Long. “Eighteen months comes with a caveat that you are fully funded,” he said. “If you don’t have funds, you can’t finish it.” Then once the study was completed, it had to be approved by the Office of Management and Budget and the Secretary of the Army, which didn’t come until December 15, 2008.

Even with the delayed funding and bureaucratic hurdles, some are asking why it took six years from the initial allocation of funds to submit a finished report and why it was so costly. In a press conference on July 11, 2007, Dave Knight of the GLC stated that the actual cost of the study was $203,400 and that a first draft was finished in the summer of 2005. If one takes those figures as gospel, there is a $240,000 difference between the funds allocated for the study and the money spent to conduct it.

In addition to questions about the time and money spent on the study, concerns also have been raised about the methodology. The data that informed the study was “collected from Great Lakes boaters who are members of the National Boater Panel.” The National Boater Panel was a voluntary online survey, not a random sample taken from the entire population of Great Lakes boaters. As a result, questions about the statistical reliability of the survey results have been raised.

But why do questions about statistical reliability, federal allocations of funds and study timelines matter to the average boater? The answer is in the cover letter John Paul Woodley, Jr., Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works), included when he submitted the final report to Representative Nancy Pelosi, D-California, and Congress.

“From a federal perspective,” he wrote, “boat harbors serving primarily or solely recreational users do not produce high priority outputs, as do harbors and waterways that support high volumes of commercial traffic. Therefore, the President’s budget continues to give priority to those harbors and waterway segments that support high volumes of commercial traffic and significant commercial fishing, subsistence and public transportation benefits.”

In other words, recreational boating has a smaller economic impact than commercial shipping, so the federal government should spend its money maintaining and improving the infrastructure of the latter at the expense of the former. For average, everyday boaters, that could mean deteriorating docks, shallow harbors and polluted waters. The “Great Lakes Recreational Boating Main Report” may seem a complicated document better left to the experts, but its impact could be felt at docks and on decks around the Great Lakes.