The Clyde Port Authority, known as Clydeport is currently owned by Peel Holdings and is Scotland’s principal west coast intercontinental and Atlantic-facing port operator. It manages navigation on the River Clyde and the provision of port facilities and services. Clydeport also has extensive landholdings throughout the West of Scotland, and is increasingly involved in property investment and development projects, such as Glasgow Harbour.

Clydeport handles approximately 7.5 million tonnes of cargo each year, and it's operations encompass an area of approximately 450 square miles of the River Clyde, the Firth of Clyde and neighbouring sea lochs. The key ports of Glasgow, Greenock, Hunterston and Ardrossan provide a wide range of facilities and services, including deep-water berthage and cargo handling, and serve Glasgow, Scotland and the North of England. Clydeport also operates Corpach in Fort William as a joint venture with Boyd Brothers, and provides services in Rosyth.

History

Glasgow Town Council became trustees of the River Clyde in 1770, with responsibility for managing the river, dredging, and harbour development. The River Improvement Trust was set up in 1809, with ferries being added to its responsibilities in 1840. As a result of the Clyde Navigation Act of 1858 the Clyde Navigation Trust succeeded the old River Improvement Trust. The new body was composed of nine councillors, nine members elected by the shipowners and two men from each of the Merchants' House, the Trades' House and the Chamber of Commerce. The Trust was responsible for managing the river, ensuring that the shipping channel was properly dredged and maintained and that harbour, dock and other facilities were developed to keep pace with the demands of trade and local shipbuilding and other industries. The Clyde Navigation Trust was reconstituted in 1905, to raise the number of trustees to forty-two. Nine extra representatives of the shipowners and harbour ratepayers were added, bringing their total to eighteen. Ten were appointed by Glasgow Corporation; two each by Glasgow Chamber of Commerce, the Merchants' House, Trades House and Lanark County Council; one each by the burghs of Dumbarton, Clydebank, Renfrew, Govan and Partick, and one by Dunbarton County Council.

The Clyde Navigation Trust was responsible for dredging the Clyde, to deepen, widen and maintain the channel along which ships sailed to and from Glasgow Harbour. In 1950 the Trust employed three bucket dredgers, eleven hopper barges (to transport the spoil out to sea for dumping), a tug, two self-propelled grab hoppers, a small dumb grab hopper and a number of punts. A new bucket dredger, the Cessnock, was added in June 1955.

With the exception of the port of Hunterston, which was acquired from British Steel in 1993, the present structure of Clydeport has been in existence since the mid 1960s and was formerly the Clyde Port Authority - a statutory Trust port formed in 1966 from the merger of the Clyde Navigation Trust, the Greenock Harbour Trust and the Clyde Lighthouses Trust.

The Clyde Port Authority was privatised in 1992, and following privatisation was acquired by the Authority’s then management and employees. Clydeport obtained a full listing on the London Stock Exchange in December 1994, and became a wholly owned subsidiary of Peel Holdings in January 2003.

Port Facilities

General Terminus Quay

General Terminus Quay, also known as Mavisbank Quay, was opened by the Clyde Navigation Trust in 1849 to provide a loading quay for coal exporters. By the 1930s the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Co operated the quay and the railway branch line (the old General Terminus and Glasgow Harbour Railway) and sidings which served it. Two coal conveyors were introduced after the First World War. During the 1950s the quay was redeveloped as an unloading facility for imported iron ore bound for the British Steel plants in Lanarkshire, which included the construction of three large Gantry Cranes. With the completion of the Hunterston Terminal in 1979, the facility was rendered obsolete, with it's cranes being demolished in January 1981. The site was redeveloped into housing and leisure developments during the 1990's.

Prince`s Dock

Prince`s Dock, also known as Pacific Quay, is in Govan on the south bank of the River Clyde. It was originally opened as the Cessnock Dock and its three basins had over 3km (2 miles) of quays. It was used for general cargoes and for loading heavy engines and boilers into recently launched ships. The hydraulically powered cranes and capstans were powered from the still-existing red brick Hydraulic Power Station. The docks were closed in the 1970s and partially filled to provide the site of the 1988 Glasgow Garden Festival. The Canting Basin (originally, the place where ships could be manouvered in and out of the dock) at the western end was used as a marina during the exhibition. It is now the site of the Glasgow Science Centre and also a media campus that includes the new headquarters of BBC Scotland and Scottish Television.



Rothesay Dock