Port Talbot Docks
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The port of Port Talbot is located on the
River Afan , name_etymology = , image = The_Afon_Afan,_Cymmer_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1001060.jpg , image_size = , image_caption = The Afan near Cymmer , map = , map_size = , map_caption ...
estuary next to
Port Talbot Steelworks Port Talbot Steelworks is an integrated steel production plant in Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, Wales, capable of producing nearly 5 million tonnes of steel slab per annum. This makes it the larger of the two major steel plants in the UK and one o ...
in the industrial town of
Port Talbot Port Talbot (, ) is a town and community in the county borough of Neath Port Talbot, Wales, situated on the east side of Swansea Bay, approximately from Swansea. The Port Talbot Steelworks covers a large area of land which dominates the south ...
,
South Wales South Wales ( cy, De Cymru) is a loosely defined region of Wales bordered by England to the east and mid Wales to the north. Generally considered to include the historic counties of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire, south Wales extends westwards ...
. The whole basin complex covers about , consisting of: an inner set of floating docks, developed from 1834 onwards; and an outer tidal basin, completed in 1970. Owned and operated by Associated British Ports, the tidal basin has the deepest berthing facilities in the
Severn estuary The Severn Estuary ( cy, Aber Hafren) is the estuary of the River Severn, flowing into the Bristol Channel between South West England and South Wales. Its high tidal range, approximately , means that it has been at the centre of discussions in t ...
and is one of only a few harbours in the UK capable of handling
Capesize Capesize ships are the largest dry cargo ships with ball mark dimension: about 170,000 DWT (deadweight tonnage) capacity, 290 m long, 45 m beam (wide), 18m draught (under water depth). They are too large to transit the Suez Canal ( Suezmax limi ...
vessels of up to ,Port of Port Talbot
/ref> mostly for the import of
iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the fo ...
and coal for use by nearby
Port Talbot Steelworks Port Talbot Steelworks is an integrated steel production plant in Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, Wales, capable of producing nearly 5 million tonnes of steel slab per annum. This makes it the larger of the two major steel plants in the UK and one o ...
.


History

Aberafan had developed as a natural harbour from the 17th century at the mouth of the River Afan, acting as a point of transport for coal and sheep to South Wales,
Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...
, and the
West Country The West Country (occasionally Westcountry) is a loosely defined area of South West England, usually taken to include all, some, or parts of the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset, Bristol, and, less commonly, Wiltshire, Gloucesters ...
. From 1750 onwards, tramlines connected the harbour to local coal mines, and the establishment of copper smelting and ironworks towards the end of the 18th century quickly developed volumes of trade. Local Member of the
UK Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative supremac ...
,
Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot FRS (10 May 1803 – 17 January 1890) was a Welsh landowner, industrialist and Liberal politician. He developed his estate at Margam near Swansea as an extensive ironworks, served by railways and a port, which was ...
of
Margam Castle Margam Castle, Margam, Port Talbot, Wales, is a late Georgian country house built for Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot. Designed by Thomas Hopper, the castle was constructed in a Tudor Revival style over a five-year period, from 1830 to 1835. ...
, recognised that improved transportation could stimulate industrial growth. As local MP he introduced a Bill in 1834 which approved the set-up of the ''Aberavon Harbour Company'' to develop the port facilities. A further Act in 1836 authorised the diversion of the river into a new channel to enable a new dock to be constructed by the renamed ''Port Talbot Dock Company'' in Rice Mansel Talbot's honour. Completed in 1837, it is considered the first major docks in South Wales, ahead even of developments at
Cardiff Docks Cardiff Docks ( cy, Dociau Caerdydd) is a port in southern Cardiff, Wales. At its peak, the port was one of the largest dock systems in the world with a total quayage of almost . Once the main port for the export of South Wales coal, the Port ...
. The lock entrance was enlarged in 1874. In 1894, the
Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company The Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company (PTR&D) was formed in 1894 to secure the means of bringing minerals, chiefly coal, to the harbour in South Wales. It took over the docks at Port Talbot that had been operated by the Port Talbot Company. I ...
was formed to directly link the port to the various competitive railways, particularly the
South Wales Mineral Railway The South Wales Mineral Railway was a railway built to serve collieries in the upper Afan Valley, and bring their output to a dock at Briton Ferry, in South Wales. It opened in stages, in 1861 and 1863. It was built on the broad gauge and had s ...
and the
Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway The Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway was a Welsh railway company formed to connect the upper end of the Rhondda Fawr with Swansea, with the chief objective of transporting coal and other minerals to Swansea docks. It was incorporated in 1882, but ...
; and the coal mines and ironworks in the surrounding Llynfi and Garw valley areas, via the
Duffryn Llynvi and Porthcawl Railway In 1861 the Llynvi Valley Railway was opened in Glamorganshire, Wales, to convey mineral products to the Bristol Channel at Porthcawl. It adopted an earlier tramroad, the Duffryn Llynvi and Porthcawl Railway. The Llynvi and Ogmore Railway was o ...
. This facilitated a further extension to the dock facilities in 1898. The founding of
Port Talbot Steelworks Port Talbot Steelworks is an integrated steel production plant in Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, Wales, capable of producing nearly 5 million tonnes of steel slab per annum. This makes it the larger of the two major steel plants in the UK and one o ...
in 1902, and
Margam Steelworks Port Talbot Steelworks is an integrated steel production plant in Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, Wales, capable of producing nearly 5 million tonnes of steel slab per annum. This makes it the larger of the two major steel plants in the UK and one o ...
in 1916, was brought about by the need for iron and steel producers to now import both ore and fuel, enabling an upscaling in volumes of production and hence economies. Resultantly, iron ore imports through Port Talbot reached 300,000 tons per annum by 1930, and 3,000,000 tons per annum by 1960. The PTR&DCo was absorbed by the
Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...
on 1 January 1922. Nationalised in 1948 by the
Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...
government of
Clement Attlee Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, (3 January 18838 October 1967) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955. He was Deputy Prime Mini ...
, ownership of the docks passed to the
British Transport Commission The British Transport Commission (BTC) was created by Clement Attlee's post-war Labour government as a part of its nationalisation programme, to oversee railways, canals and road freight transport in Great Britain (Northern Ireland had the se ...
, under its Docks and Inland Waterways Executive. The
Transport Act 1962 The Transport Act 1962 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Described as the "most momentous piece of legislation in the field of railway law to have been enacted since the Railway and Canal Traffic Act 1854", it was passed by Haro ...
abolished the commission and distributed its assets to five successor bodies, with the nationalised
British Transport Docks Board {{Unreferenced, date=August 2009 The British Transport Docks Board (BTDB) was a nationalised industry, managing former railway-owned docks in Great Britain. It was created by the Transport Act 1962 and abolished by the Transport Act 1981, which p ...
inheriting the dock undertakings, other than harbours used primarily by railway steamer services, including Port Talbot. The BTDB was among the first nationalised industries to be privatised by the
Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
government of
Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...
.


Port Talbot Tidal Harbour

However, further increases in the volume of goods handling were restricted by the docks inability to handle the new
bulk carrier A bulk carrier or bulker is a merchant ship specially designed to transport unpackaged bulk cargo — such as grains, coal, ore, steel coils, and cement — in its cargo holds. Since the first specialized bulk carrier was built in 1852, econom ...
s, with the old docks unable to accept a ship of greater than . In 1966, work commenced on the construction of the new Port Talbot Tidal Harbour, south-west of the existing docks system. Completed in 1970, it was the first dry-bulk cargo terminal in the UK capable of accepting ships in excess of . Its completion enabled the complete closure of the old docks complex, the
Beeching Axe The Beeching cuts (also Beeching Axe) was a plan to increase the efficiency of the nationalised railway system in Great Britain. The plan was outlined in two reports: ''The Reshaping of British Railways'' (1963) and ''The Development of the ...
and the
UK miners' strike (1984–1985) UK miners' strike may refer to: *UK miners' strike (1893) *South Wales miners' strike (1910) * National coal strike of 1912 *UK miners' strike (1921) *UK miners' strike (1953) *UK miners' strike (1969), a widespread unofficial strike *UK miners' st ...
having negated the need for coal export. Further dredging in 1996 deepened the harbour by 2.6 metres, increasing the maximum size of vessel that can be accommodated today to .


Present

In 1998, after being closed to shipping since 1959, the old floating docks were re-opened to handle coastwise cargoes of ground and granulated blast-furnace slag for Civil & Marine's new cement works at Rio Tinto Wharf. Since handling steel products in March 2007, other cargoes handled have included: timber, sand, stone, and heavy lifts. Today they are capable of handling ships of up to . Connecting rail transport is handled via
DB Schenker Rail (UK) DB Cargo UK (formerly DB Schenker Rail UK and English, Welsh & Scottish Railway (EWS)), is a British rail freight company headquartered in Doncaster, England. The company was established in early 1995 as ''North & South Railways'', successful ...
's
Margam Knuckle Yard Margam Knuckle Yard is a railway yard in Margam, South Wales, on the South Wales Main Line, operated by DB Schenker Rail (UK). The yard is the major freight yard of the region, handling all of the rail freight movements from Port Talbot Steelwork ...
. The docks are used by Port Talbot steelworks for the export of steel products and the import of raw materials for manufacturing steel, with cargoes of coal, iron ore, sand, cement, and processed and granulated slag. They also have the capacity to handle large volumes of renewable energy fuels, such as wood chips and biomass. In 2007, the port handled 9,502,000 tonnes of cargo. The northern area of the docks is designated as the Port Talbot Industrial Estate. The development of the Port Talbot Peripheral Distributor Road includes roundabouts which provide direct access to this development area and a potential development area adjacent to the docks. The new link will pass through the south of Port Talbot Steelworks and have links to the under-used wharves in the docks which have development potential.Neath Port Talbot County Borough Council - Press Release - Public consultation for a regeneration site Port Talbot 12.03.2009
/ref> There have been proposals for the development of an intermodal freight terminal at the port.


Nearest places

*
Aberavon Beach Aberavon Beach ( cy, Traeth Aberafan), also known as Aberavon Sands, is a three-mile (5 km) stretch of sandy beach on the north-eastern edge of Swansea Bay in Port Talbot, Wales. With its high breaker waves, it is popular with surfers. Aber ...
*
Aberavon Aberavon ( cy, Aberafan) is a town and community in Neath Port Talbot county borough, Wales. The town derived its name from being near the mouth of the river Afan, which also gave its name to a medieval lordship. Today it is essentially a distri ...
*
Taibach Taibach or Tai-bach ( en, Little Houses) is a community and suburban district of Port Talbot, Wales. It is a settlement centered on the main A48 road, sandwiched between the river Ffrwdwyllt and Margam. Parts of Margam are within the community bo ...
*
Port Talbot steelworks Port Talbot Steelworks is an integrated steel production plant in Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, Wales, capable of producing nearly 5 million tonnes of steel slab per annum. This makes it the larger of the two major steel plants in the UK and one o ...


References


External links


ABP: Port of Port Talbot
{{coord, 51, 35, 12, N, 3, 47, 10, W , region:GB , display=title Transport in Neath Port Talbot Buildings and structures in Port Talbot Ports and harbours of Wales Swansea Bay Ports and harbours of the Bristol Channel