Merseyside trio
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Liverpool and Birkenhead TO SOME people Liverpool may be better known these days as the home of the Beatles and Ken Dodd's Diddymen, but to others it is Britain's front door—a port with a long history and a substantial cargo and passenger trade.
The port is controlled by the 17-member Mersey Docks and Harbour Board—a nonprofit-making statutory trust—consisting of six shippers, six traders, four members nominated by the Ministry of Transport and its co-opted chairman Mr. J. C. Taylor. The director-general is Sir Clifford Dove.
The docks owned and controlled by the Board extend for about seven miles at Liverpool on the northern bank of the Mersey and four miles at Birkenhead on the south bank. The dock areas amount to 2,080 acres and there are 37 miles of quays; 182 berths are used for foreign trade and 40 for coastal shipping trade. Approximately 84 shipping lines operate regular ocean-going outward services from the port and eight lines operate regular coastwise services mainly to Northern and Southern Ireland and the Isle of Man. Ocean-going freight and passengers are carried to all parts of the world.
Most berths in the docks are equipped with the latest types of handling machinery peculiar to the cargo handled, for example, bulk sugar conveyors, refrigerated meat discharging chutes and conveyors direct to cold store, and specialized banana discharge equipment for Geest Industries. The Tranmere oil terminal in the river can accommodate tankers up to 200,000 tons deadweight. At Birkenhead general cargo is handled and there are also bulk handling installations for iron ores and similar cargoes.
In the field of containerization Liverpool, like Southampton, has started work on major projects, notably the Seaforth terminal which is due to come into operation in 1971. This project is estimated to cost £32m and will provide the port with 10 extra deep-sea berths for container operations, roll-on/roll-off ferry terminals and special cargo berths for such commodities as grain.
While this major civil engineering scheme is being carried out, it has been decided that in order not to miss the chance to cash in on the container boom at the earliest opportun
ity, container facilities should be provided in what was formerly Gladstone dry dock. This has now been converted at a cost of Elm, which includes the provision of two 35-ton Stothert and Pitt container cranes and six other items of handling equipment. A water depth of 43ft enables very large vessels to use the terminal.
The Gladstone container terminal was originally planned as a temporary measure but such has been the success of the operation that plans are being prepared for a second berth at Hornby dock to be in operation by the end of the year.
Other unit load facilities are provided at Coburg dock from which Ireman Stevedoring Co. Ltd. operates services to Ireland, the Isle of Man and on other short sea trades. A new fully automated freight terminal for the B+ I line on a 17-acre site in the Trafalgar Dock region is planned and awaiting MoT authorization.
Roll-on/roll-off ferry services are operated to Dublin by the British and Irish Steam Packet Co. Ltd. and to Belfast by the Belfast Steamship Co. Ltd. These services are mainly for passengers and passenger car traffic.
A port information centre in the Docks and Harbour Board offices, open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays, keeps a current check on the loading and discharging of all ships in the port. Mobile radio-controlled patrols report back on the state of traffic and any delays on congestion in the berths. This information is recorded on large wall boards so that at any time of the day an assessment can be made of delay which may be encountered by vehicles entering the docks to load or discharge freight. Drivers, haulage contractors and any other interested persons can obtain this up-to-date information by phoning 051-236 0911 or by asking the operator for Freefone 667—this is a free service which can be used en route to the docks or before the vehicle sets out.
In addition to capital expenditure on the container facilities, some £55m is being spent on general dockside modernization and £2m on export berths at Birkenhead to bring this port up to. a showpiece standard "comparable with any port in the world".
Liverpool's own description is Britain's front door, and with reasonable rail connections, Freightliner services and motorway standard roads connecting the port and city to the important industrial and trading centres this claim has a lot in it. However, I do wish this was backed up by adequate signposting of the dock routes within the city. It is extremely frustrating to find oneself in a queue for the Mersey Tunnel through lack of directions when the docks are your destination.
Garston This small but thriving port on the north bank of the Mersey and about four miles inland from Liverpool is another of the BTDB-owned and operated ports.
There are three docks in the port, the North Dock from which Irish Sea Ferries operate their unit load services, the Old Dock and the Stalbridge Dock which Cawoods Containers use for their container terminal.
Major traffics passing through the port are exported coal—over lm tons were handled last year direct from rail wagon through coaling appliances to ship—and imported timber, much of which arrives loose and has to be • manhandled and stacked on vehicles and stillages. In the peak timber season, I am told, all spare ground space in the docks is used for stacking and storage.
As coal is the biggest tonnage traffic, rail is the main form of transport serving the port, but road transport carries approximately 85 per cent of the other traffics handled. Prior to 1952 the port was served 100 per cent by rail.
Besides coal and timber other important trade consists of iron and steel, which last year amounted to about 70,000 tons having built up from nothing in two years, and liner board.
Unit load services from Garston to Warren Point (near Newry mid-way between Dublin and Belfast) are operated by Irish Sea Ferries who have been using the dock for six years. Most loads are carried in curved top containers and are usually packed by customers on their own premises. A daily service operates on six weekdays and Sunday sailings are arranged if traffic warrants it. Any type of traffic which fits the containers is carried and in fact the company has obtained quite a number of regular customers by carrying cargo refused by other operators. Approximately 50 per cent of the traffic carried is destined for Southern Ireland but no Customs problems are encountered when crossing the Border because only one haulage contractor is used and he is known to the authorities thereby reducing formalities.
Regular container services to Belfast (three times weekly) are operated by the newly formed Cawoods Containers from their terminal in the port. The service is at present depending on the cellular container vessel m.v. Craigavad but consideration is being given to a second vessel. The terminal covers some three to four acres on the site of the old banana wharf and is completely concreted for marshalling and stacking containers. A 35-ton Strachan and Henshaw Container crane is used for loading and unloading and this is supported by a Demag straddle carrier for movement of containers within the terminal. This machine is linked to the depot control office, as is the crane, by short-wave radio and the quay foreman also has a radio link for ease of passing instructions; 20ft and 401t containers are handled in the terminal. Since its opening in May 1968, trade through the terminal has considerably increased and the Cawoods depot manager, Mr. Norman Plevin, is looking forward to greater things.
Like all ports Garston considers it is ideally situated to the traffic it handles and in this case the M6 motorway only 15 miles away provides fast road links to north Lancashire and the industrial Midlands. The port is near to the coalfields and densely industrialized areas of Lancashire, Yorkshire, Staffordshire, Leicestershire and Warwickshire.
Covered warehouse accommodation available in the docks amounts to 230,000 sq.ft. and there is open storage space for some 100,000 tons of minerals and other traffics. Road and rail weighbridges are provided in the docks.
Although small, Garston is nevertheless progressive, always on the look-out for ways of increasing its share of traffic passing in and out of the Mersey region. Unit load traffic constitutes a growing proportion of tonnage through Garston, amounting to 143,000 tons in 1968.
Export clearance Congestion at the docks is critical to the problem of speeding Britain's export deliveries. British Road Services Ltd. has established the Merseyside Export Clearance Centre to quicken the flow of exports to the local docks.
The centre has been established to free vehicles from the need to spend wasteful time-consuming periods at the docks waiting to unload.
Shipments up to 5 tons will be accepted both for delivery to the docks and town addresses. Loads will be sorted to ship destinations enabling a vehicle to deliver many consignments to one ship, thereby eliminating the necessity of several vehicles delivering to the same ship.
Although the centre has been in operation for only a few months, large tonnages are already being handled. Demand for the facilities has been such that space has been cleared for a future doubling of capacity.
In its initial stages, the rapid clearance centre was used only by BRS Ltd. branches and National Freight Corporation companies. However, own-account carriers and other hauliers are now able to use the centre.
The Liverpool Dock and Mersey Authority has welcomed the B RS scheme as an efficient and imaginative plan in the fight against congestion at the docks.