Refineries Preserf
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Fransport Problems
Finding Buses To Carry Workers To Esso Was A Western Welsh Poser By C. S. Dunbar, M.Inst.T.
THE opening by the Duke of Edinburgh yesterday of the new Esso refinery at Gelliswick Bay, Pembrokeshire, has drawn attention to a relatively. little-known but very
beautiful part of the country, which possesses, in Milford Haven, one of the finest natural harbours in the world.
Stretching, with its creeks, for many miles inland and almost completely landlocked, it offers a safe anchorage for the largest vessels now afloat or likely to he built in the foreseeable future. Yet the Haven has no great port trading to all parts of the world. because it is so remote from the main.
centres of industry and population. Esso wanted a site for a refinery where there was sufficient depth of water for 100,000-ton tankers at all states of the tide.
The remoteness of Milford Haven was no drawback as, once the crude oil was refined, it would be easy to ship it out again by coastal tanker to those distributing centres round the coast or on navigable rivers which are actually near the consuming areas.
Thus. of the 4f m. tons a year which the new refinery is to handle, 98 per cent.
will go out by water and most of the small remainder by rail over a new branch from the Haverforclwest-Milford line. The portion of this branch for which Esso is responsible has been built, but has not yet been connected to the
British Railways system. During the building of the refinery, a great deal of material went to Milford Haven station and had to be taken thence by road to the site some 21. to 3 miles away,
Great tonnages were handled direct by road, and the conveyance of the labour force was a problem in itself. At the peak of activity about .3,500 men were employed, including about 2,300 who had to be imported, but the numbers are now declining fast. Eventually the refinery will be staffed by about .330 people, a small figure which has been n6
made possible by centralizing in one room the control of all processes.
The jetty, at which incoming and outgoing cargoes are handled, stretches out 3,500 ft. into the Haven and is T-shaped. It is constructed so that the fishing vessels which normally sail inshore can get under it, and is large enough to handle five tankers a day, with a 24-hour turn-round per ship. Discharge and loading are entirely by flexible connections and the liquid passes through pipes built alongside or under the jetty.
Although road transport will not figure to any appreciable extent in the handling of the refinery's products to the outside world, a number of vehicles are required for internal work. These, it is interesting to note, are fitted with water-box spark arresters.
For site operation and maintenance the company relies mainly on 20 LandRovers, a tool and stores van (racked inside and radio-fitted), six 5-cwt. pickups and six estate cars of Ford manufacture. For delivery of stores. Thames vehicles are used, these being a 2-tonner and three 5-tonners. To handle heavy material there are a Simon hoist, three Taylor Jumbos. two large cranes, one diesel fork-lift for outdoor work and one battery-driven fork-lift for work inside the stores. A straddle carrier is on order.
One of the Land-Rovers is being fitted up with welding equipment. The Marine Department (which deals with the tanker crews) has a Thames 15-cwt. van and 12-seater bus. For further constructional work there is a Massey-Ferguson tractor with a digger in front, and a bulldozer.
Two fire-engines (Bedford and Dennis) provide for security and there is a Morris ambulance for accidents. An ex-Western Welsh bus is kept to take visitors round.
The large and well-equipped workshop and stores are intended for plant maintenance and not for heavy vehicle repairs, which will normally be put out. Every
body except the office staff and the gatemen wears a plastics safetyhelmet out of doors. These are in different colours, according to the section the wearer works in, and have the wearer's name on the front. .
Unfortunately, it is very difficult to hide a refinery as its most prominent and important features all rise vertically, notably in this case chimney stacks 300 ft. high, to give adequate dispersal of eases. The siting of this plant, largely in a ravine, does help and Esso intend to spend a considerable sum in landscaping. as time goes by.
One suggestion is to screen the site by quick-growing trees,but 350 acres is a large area and the fire risk (although remote) cannot be entirely neglected, so that a definite decision on this point has not yet been made. To guard against pollution of the Haven, all waste water and all drainage from the site pass into a skimming pond, where entrained oil is removed before the effluent is pumped out below low-water mark. All tankers have to discharge their ballast water (in case it might he contaminated) into tanks. whence this also passes to the skimming pond.
The people of Pembrokeshire are in a difficult position, torn between the desire to preserve their beautiful countryside and the urgent necessity to provide more work, The whole county has a population only a little over 90,000, nearly all dependent on agriculture and fisheries. The soil is good and the climate mild, so that agriculture flourishes. But the fisheries have declined badly. In 1947 there were 120 trawlers based on Milford Haven. Today there are only 27. It is said that every trawler means work on shore for nine or ten men (porters, boxmakers, etc.). so that the loss of employment has been severe in a small community.
11 was told by officials of Western Welsh that there used to be 15 trawler crews living in Haverfordwest: today there is one solitary man. Obviously the new refinery will not, in the first instance, do much to help the situation, as, of the 330 to be employed at least half will be specialists who are being or have been transferred from the other Esso refinery at Fawley, Hants. But everyone hopes that before long, Milford will follow the example of Fawley and develop .all the many by-products which that refinery produces.
.Fresh industries will then open up, and the district will really start to become industrialized. Some wonder if coal will ever be mined on a large scale in the area. There is a substantial belt of anthracite running across the centre of the county, but there has never been more than a handful of small pits, because of transport costs. It is strange to think that the pleasure resort of Saundersfoot, near Tenby, was once a coal port.
The task of taking the constructional workers to and from the Esso site has fallen mainly on Western Welsh, although some of the contractors and sub-contractors have employed buses of their own and, from more distant parts, a few independents have had vehicles on hire. At the peak, Western Welsh operated 32 vehicles a day to the refinery. Fourteen from Milford, four from Neyland and four from Haverfordwest, via Tiers Cross, were stage carriages and ten were on contract; there were also two journeys for office workers.
Now the stage specials number eight from Milford. three from Haverfordwest, via Tiers Cross. There are three contract vehicles, the two journeys for the office staff and a 7 a.m. run for cleaners. In addition, when the construction gangs work what is called a half-shift and finish at 8 p.m., anything from three to eighteen additional buses are needed.
The awkward part of this is that the contractors are not able to tell the bus office at Haverfordwest exactly what is needed until about 3.30 p.m. on the day, as everything depends on the weather and the rate of progress. This, of course, often means a great search for crews but an Esso spokesman told me that Western Welsh had surmounted such difficulties magnificently. For the opening day. 18 coaches were supplied by the company to carry the guests from Milford Station. The purpose of the specials to and from Neyland is mainly to connect with the ferry between there and Hobbs Point, which has been run for many years by Pembrokeshire County Council. Until 1956 the single boat in service was a miserably small affair, holding only five cars or three cars and a lorry. A new one was then bought, and this is a great improvement as 17 or 18 vehicles can be accommodated, hut it still provides a service approximately • every half-horn only.
The bridge connecting the pontoon at Neyland with the shore has a weight limit of five tons gross, so that no large vehicles can be carried across. At Hobbs Point on the southern side, there is no pontoon, so that when there is a very low tide the conveyance of vehicles has to be suspended altogether.
While the pattern of stage service in south-west Pembrokeshire has not changed greatly in the last four years, there has been a notable simplification of ownership. The acquisition of Greens Transport (Haverfordwest), Ltd., on January I, 1957, and the absorption on August 31, 1959, of the services of Harries and Sons and Prendergast Motors, Ltd. (two related concerns), gave Western Welsh a monopoly west of the Fish guardHaverfordwest road. It also greatly strengthened the company's position south of the Haverfordwest-Carmarthen trunk road, A40.
Western Welsh first came into the district in 1929 as successors to the G.W.R,, who for many years worked services from Haverfordwest and Fishguard to St. David's. The following year they bought the Carmarthen-Narberth and Narberth-Tenby services of Edwards Bros., Carmarthen, and in 1931 extended from Narberth to Haverfordwest. Edwards' Tenby service was only a summer one, hut )n 1934 the purchase of the business of Ebsworth Bros.. Ltd.,
„CavnaferAot of Laugharne, gave them a direct all-the-year-round service to Tenhy, via Red Roses. No further acquisitions took place until Greens' business was bought.
Greens' Motors, Ltd.—the parent of Greens' Transport (Haverfordwest), Ltd.—started business in July, 1919, when it took over the garage business of the Green family, long established in the town as ironmongers. Bus services were started in 1921 with a one-ton Ford, on solid tyres and with a brake body, running three times a day to Milford Haven. At the time of the transfer to Western Welsh, the Green fleet numbered 45, 20 of them double-deckers. Only two of the double-deckers now remain in the Western Welsh fleet at Haverfordwest.
The acquisition gave. Western Welsh a Haverfordwest-Tenby service, and a local service between Tenby and Saundersfoot, and got them into Pembroke Dock for the first time with two journeys a day on Wednesdays and Saturdays. The Haverfordwest-Fishguard service completed the triangle Haverfordwest-St. David's-Fish guard, and justified the opening of a new depot at Fishguard on August 31, 1959, to supplement that at St. David's opened in 1954. More relevant +.o this article, all the. services between Haverfordwest and the northern shore of Milford Haven passed to them. the consolidation being completed when the Harries and Prendergast services to Broad-Haven and to Milford, via Tiers Cross, were added.
Except for some adjustments on the Tenhy and Saundersfoot routes, Greens' timetables have largely been retained— including, I notice, the anomaly that a passenger from Haverfordwest to Neyland who cannot travel on the few occasions when there is a direct bus just misses a connection at Milford—but perhaps they do not interpret the timetables too literally!
The biggest change has been on the Milford-Hubberston route, which was served by Greens only five times a day (eight on Saturday) and, had no Sunday service. Because of Esso the service is now half-hourly with extras, and there are also five journeys on Sundays.
Thirty minutes (plus extras) is also the normai weekday service between Haverfordwest and Milford. The former Harries service, via Tiers Cross, gives an alternative on certain days. An hourly service, with extras, is given between Milford Haven and Neyland, and the latter is connected with Haverfordwest via either Johnston or Rosemarket, about 10 times a day.
On four days a week it is possible to travel from Haverfordwest to Burton Ferry, while Llangwm, which is farther up the estuary towards Haverfordwest, has nine journeys a day from the county town, 13 on Saturdays, but no Sunday service. A journey of nine minutes connects Neyland with Hazelbeach five times a day (seven on Saturdays). At Milford, in addition to the Hubberston service, there are also local mutes serving Pill and Hakin.
The West Wales area of Western Welsh was formerly controlled from Carmarthen, but the growth of the company's business in Pembrokeshire has caused the removal of the area office to Haverfordwest, where Mr. R. C. Maunder (formerly at Pontypool) is now in charge. Carmarthen is the centre of a sub-area. The fleet in Pembrokeshire numbers 35 single-deckers and 28 double-deckers at Haverfordwest, six single-deckers at Fishguard and 10 single-deckers and three :louble-deckers at St. David's.
One-man Buses
Of the single-deckers at Haverfordwest, six are Albion Nimbus and there are two more Albions at St. David's and one at Fishguard. One-man buses have been widely adopted by the company as the answer to the problem of unremunerative services.
The problem has been particularly acute in south Pembrokeshire, as 98 per cent. of Greens' mileage was on stage work and, through past history, there were many anomalies in their fares structure. Some of these still remain because of railway competition. For instance, the Goodwick-Tenby (a round trip of 72 miles) day return, which was only 5s. in 1955, is still only 5s. 4d, The service from Haverfordwest to St. David's and Fishguard must have their conductors, but the other trunk services (Haverfordwest to Carmarthen and to Tenby, St. David's to Fishguard and Goodwiek to Cardigan) are all worked now by oneman 43-44-seaters.
The services to Dale are licensed for one-man operation and this will be introduced as soon as vehicles are available. Near Dale is a-. naval station at Kete to which a contract vehicle is run on Saturday morning, but this will soon cease as the station is. closing. It seemed at one time as if traffic to and from 13rawdy Fleet Air Arm station on the St. David's road would almost fade out but, latterly, since the Admiralty reduced its payments for the use of private cars, there_ has been a welcome revival. At present thc Western Welsh fleet at Haverfordwest has to make do with a place called Marsh Yard (formerly in Greens' ownership) which possesses. inadequate office accommodation and very little covered sPace for the vehicles. There are plans for new buildings, but these will be affected by the line of a by-pass which will go right through the site. The local authorities at Haverfordwest and Milford Haven have plans for bus stations.
Turning now to the area south of the D8
Haven, this (with the exception of the twice-weekly ex-Green service to Pembroke Dock) is entirely in the hands of W. L. Silcox and Son, who consolidated their position by buying in 1959 the business of D. J. Morrison, of Tenby. Mr. Morrison opened a garage at Tenby in 1921, started stage services in -1927, and 10 years later bought Grey Garages, Ltd., whose name he retained for his touring side. The Morrison fleet numbered 19 at the time of the transfer.
Out of Cycles
Like Greens' the Silcox business grew out of a cycle shop. Mr. W. H. Silcox ran taxis after the 1914-18 war and in 1932 entered the stage-carriage field by buying the services and eight buses of John Ford. In 1948, his son, Mr. L. W. Silcox, who had obtained a degree in engineering, bought the two buses of E. Jones, which were operated under the fleet name of Pioneer Bus Service between Pembroke and Pembroke Dock.
W. L. Silcox and Son is still a private partnership. Mr. Silcox, Senr., looks after the public garage and car sales side. while Mr. L. W. Silcox is, in effect, general manager of the bus section. The Silcox fleet consists of 40 vehicles, six of which arc at present out of service. The active list consists of 10 single-deck buses (eight Bristol, one A.E.C. and one Guy), 12 double-deck buses (six Bristol, two Leyland and four Guy) and 12 coaches (eight Leyland, three A.E.C. and one Guy). The off-service vehicles are three single-deckers (Leyland, Bristol and A.E.C.) and three double-deck Bristols. The Morrison take-over has led to an extraordinary economy in vehicles as Silcox are now doing with 40 vehicles the work for which the two firms independently needed a total of 55. An office is maintained in Trafalgar .Street, Tenby, and six vehicles are garaged in that town in the winter and 12 in summer.
The amalgamation has, of course, led to some revision of services, as the companies had some mileage in common, but there has not been as much change as one might expect. For instance, Morrison had a service from Tenby to Jameston, via Manorbier, and Silcox one from Pembroke Dock to Manorbier, via Jameston, but these are still worked separately. It would baffle anyone to describe lucidly the working of most of the Silcox services, because completely regular headways and even consistent daily routes are. almost impossible.
There are violent fluctuations of traffic, both during the day and between seasons. As far as I can see from a close study. of time-tables, Silcox have not withdrawn from more than afew short lengths of road during the past five years and, in fact, there seem to be One Or two extra connections.
Silcox carry a great number of servicemen, although the naval base at Pembroke Dock is not as important as it once was. Both the Army and the R.A.F. have large establishments, and in the summer months as many as 3,000 men may be in training at Castlemartin, with a consequently large demand at the
week-ends for transport to Tenby and other places of interest.
Express services for the forces are run, as required, from Pembroke Dock and Manorbier to Birmingham and Manchester. On Sundays throughout the year a coach leaves Pembroke Dock at 7.45 a.m. (summer) or 6.45 (winter) to connect with an Associated Motorways coach for Cheltenham at Tenby. Only pre-hooked passengers are carried. In the reverse direction the 9.0 p.m. ex Tenby waits, if necessary, for the coach _from Cheltenham.
There are two other journeys on Sundays between Pembroke Dock and Tenby, two between Tenby and Amroth and a few to Manorbier. But apart from these no Silcox services appear to be worked on winter Sundays. There are not many more journeys on summerSundays either, except between Tenby, Narberth and Whitland. Such Sunday services as are run (except the Pembroke Dock-Tenby one) have been inherited from the Morrison regime.
Mr. Morrison's operations differed greatly from Silcox's, as all his services were daily and he had no short town or suburban routes, Silcox do a considerable business in day and half-day tours, and make a point of describing the principal places seen on each tour in a neatly produced pamphlet.
B.P. Tanker Terminal
Well to the west of Pembroke Dock is Angle Bay, on the east side of which B.P. have established a tanker terminal. This project is quite different from the Esso establishment on the opposite shore of the Haven. B.P.'s problem was to get crude oil to the Llandarcy refinery near Swansea in view of the trend to everlarger tankers. Milford Haven possessed deep enough water at all tides to carry anything afloat, so B.P. bought a disused fort at Popton Point on the north-eastern tip of Angle Bay and a stretch of land down to Kilpaison at the south-eastern corner of the bay.
A jetty, sticking out into the Haven and similar to the Esso one, provides a berth for the tankers, which discharge into pipes leading to storage tanks at Kilpaison. Here the oil is kept until it is needed at Llandarey, to which place it flows through a 60-mile pipeline. B.P.'s purchase of a coastal strip has not deprived visitors of access to Angle Bay, and every care is being taken to protect the amenities of the neighbourhood.
At the peak of construction about a thousand men were employed on the site and Silcox were running eight specials a day, but the completed installation will only need about 50 men to work it, so that the demand on local transport will not be great.
Silcox's bus depot is at Waterloo. 11 miles from Pembroke Dock, where they do all the engineering work for the private-ear section as well as the buses. They specialize in bodywork. Their policy is generally to buy second-hand vehicles and, if necessary, to switch the bodies about or after them to requirements.