The Fishermans Net

My ancient Zippy 2500m and Daiwa Supercast seem to be getting a bit softer in the tip after 29 years of faithful service and I have two choices, get them TLC from a boss rod builder or get them replaced. I would like some advice about decent rods for fishing the Mersey especially from the time served local anglers. 80% of my fishing is done in the river and 60% of that is done at Seaforth so the rod will need to have a bit of backbone (even though I only use 7HT's which get a bit of a pounding from the tough fishing but I just love them). I won't say money is no object but I don't mind spending a few extra quid for something that will probably last the rest of my fishimg days. Lastly, the rod length. My current ones are 12 feet long but I had a 13ft Conoflex for a while before I snapped the tip in the car door and really liked the feel of the extra foot while casting. I've noticed that it seems to be "fashionable" for rods to be up to 16 feet long at the moment and wondered if anybody has one of these longer rods and what they fee the (if any) advantages are.

Ray