The Port of Bristol comprises the commercial, and former commercial, docks situated in and near the city of Bristol in England. The Port of Bristol Authority was the commercial title of the Bristol City, Avonmouth, Portishead and Royal Portbury Docks when they were operated by Bristol City Council, which ceased trade when the Avonmouth and Royal Portbury Docks were leased to The Bristol Port Company in 1991.
The Port of Bristol grew up on the banks of the Rivers Avon and Frome, at their confluence upstream of the Avon Gorge which connects the city with the Severn Estuary and Bristol Channel. This part of the port was known as the Bristol City Docks, and is now more usually known as Bristol Harbour. The Avon and Frome are small, shallow rivers incapable in themselves of accommodating ocean-going ships, even those of the age of sail, as can still be seen by inspecting the branch of the Avon known as the New Cut at low tide. The harbour depended on the extreme tides (14 m, 46 ft) experienced in the Bristol Channel. Ships that wished to enter the harbour waited for the tide to begin to rise and floated up the river, through the Avon Gorge, and into the harbour on the tide. Ships leaving the harbour set out at the high tide, and floated down to the sea with the ebbing tide. In the 1800s the harbour was enclosed by locks, together with a diversion of the River Avon, resulting in its alternative name of the Floating Harbour, the Float, taken from the fact that the ships were able to float at all times, rather than resting in the mud at low tide, as had previously been the case.
Shipping Masters appointed under the Merchant Shipping Act included Henry Hellier Peters. [1] [2]
| Bristol Dock Act 1884 | |
|---|---|
| Act of Parliament | |
 | |
| Long title | An Act to enable the Mayor Aldermen and Burgesses of the City of Bristol to purchase the Undertakings of the Bristol Port and Channel Dock Company the Bristol Port and Channel Dock Warehouse Company Limited and the Portishead Warehouse Company Limited and the Dock Undertaking of the Bristol and Portishead Pier and Railway Company and for other purposes. |
| Citation | 47 & 48 Vict. c. cclv |
| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 14 August 1884 |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
The navigation of the Avon Gorge always presented a challenge, and became more and more difficult as ships got larger. In 1877, Avonmouth Old Dock, the first of the Avonmouth Docks, was opened, and in 1884 the Bristol Corporation acquired both the Avonmouth and Portishead Docks by the Bristol Dock Act 1884 (47 & 48 Vict. c. cclv). [3] In 1908 the Royal Edward Dock was built at Avonmouth to the north of the mouth of the River Avon and with direct access to the Severn estuary and Bristol Channel.
In 1972, the large deep water Royal Portbury Dock, across the river mouth from the Royal Edward Dock was constructed, again with direct access to the Bristol Channel.
These developments rendered the old Bristol City Docks in the Floating Harbour redundant as a commercial dock, and they have since been redeveloped as the centrepiece of many leisure, residential and retail developments in and around Bristol city centre. A sand company was the last to use the docks commercially in 1991. [4]
The closure of the power stations at Portishead also made the Portishead Dock redundant, and it was finally closed in 1992.
In 1991, Bristol City Council sold a 150-year lease of the Avonmouth and Royal Portbury Docks to First Corporate Shipping Ltd, [5] a private company owned by Terence Mordaunt and David Ord. The business trades as The Bristol Port Company (BPC). Since then over £600 million has been invested in the docks and the annual tonnage throughput has increased from 4 million tonnes to 14 million tonnes.
Up to 2014, the company made several applications to buy the site's freehold but these were rejected. Following a referendum in 2012, the city voters created the role of Mayor, subsequently electing George Ferguson. In March 2015 he and his cabinet decided to sell the freehold for £10 million but retain a 12.5% non-voting stake in the company. The city's council members voted on 2 June to object to the decision on the grounds of poor value for money, and referred it back to the mayor. [6] Two weeks later the Mayor's cabinet resolved to sell the freehold. [7] [8] Following criticism by the editor of Money Week magazine, [9] George Ferguson told the Financial Times the deal was exceptional value for the city. [10] [11]
First Corporate Shipping donated £25,000 to both Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt during the 2019 Conservative party leadership contest. [12]
The Port of Bristol is one of the six sites Boris Johnson proposed for a Freeport, saying they were an "excellent" way to boost investment in left-behind parts of the country. [13] The Bristol Port Company welcomed the news, seeing it having the potential to boost investment opportunities in and around UK ports. [14] However some port and trade experts predicted the main effect would be to divert activity into the port from the surrounding region rather than create new jobs. [15]
 | This section needs to be updated. The reason given is: 14 years out of date.(October 2024) |
As of 2010 [update] , a new deepsea container terminal is planned in Avonmouth. [16]
The River Avon is a river in the southwest of England. To distinguish it from a number of other rivers of the same name, it is often called the Bristol Avon. The name 'Avon' is loaned from an ancestor of the Welsh word afon, meaning 'river'.
Portishead is a town and civil parish in the North Somerset unitary authority area, in the county of Somerset, England. With a population of 26,366 at the 2021 Census, the town is located on the Severn Estuary opposite Cardiff and Newport in Wales. The town is 8 miles (13 km) to the west of Bristol and 18 miles northeast of Weston-super-Mare.
SS Great Western was a wooden-hulled paddle-wheel steamship with four masts, the first steamship purpose-built for crossing the Atlantic, and the initial unit of the Great Western Steamship Company. Completed in 1838, she was the largest passenger ship in the world from 1837 to 1839, the year the SS British Queen went into service.
Avonmouth is a port and outer suburb of Bristol, England, on the north bank of the mouth of the River Avon and the eastern shore of the Severn Estuary. Part of the Port of Bristol, Avonmouth Docks is important to the region's maritime economy, hosting large vessels for the unloading and exporting of heavier goods. Much of the land use is industrial, including warehousing, light industry, electrical power and sanitation. The M5 motorway bisects the neighbourhood, with junctions onto the A4 road and M49 motorway, and it has stations on the Severn Beach Line railway.
The Avon Gorge is a 1.5-mile (2.5-kilometre) long gorge on the River Avon in Bristol, England. The gorge runs south to north through a limestone ridge 1.5 miles (2.4 km) west of Bristol city centre, and about 3 miles (5 km) from the mouth of the river at Avonmouth. The gorge forms the boundary between the unitary authorities of North Somerset and Bristol, with the boundary running along the south bank. As Bristol was an important port, the gorge formed a defensive gateway to the city.
Bristol Harbour is the harbour in the city of Bristol, England. The harbour covers an area of 70 acres. It is the former natural tidal river Avon through the city but was made into its current form in 1809 when the tide was prevented from going out permanently. A tidal by-pass was dug for 2 miles through the fields of Bedminster for the river, known as the "River Avon New Cut", "New Cut", or simply "The Cut". It is often called the Floating Harbour as the water level remains constant and it is not affected by the state of the tide on the river in the Avon Gorge, The New Cut or the natural river southeast of Temple Meads to its source.
Portbury is a village and civil parish in Somerset, England, within the unitary authority of North Somerset. The parish includes the hamlet Sheepway, which is situated on moorland at the northern edge of the Gordano valley, between the Gordano services on the M5 motorway and Portishead, near the Royal Portbury Dock. The parish has a population of 827.
The Royal Portbury Dock is part of the Port of Bristol, in England. It is situated near the village of Portbury on the southern side of the mouth of the Avon, where the river joins the Severn estuary — the Avonmouth Docks are on the opposite side of the Avon, within Avonmouth. The deepwater dock was constructed between 1972 and 1977, and is now a major port for the import of motor vehicles into the UK. The M5 motorway runs nearby, and the huge car storage compounds around the dock are visible from the Avonmouth Bridge. A waste industrial area west of the port is being developed as the Portbury Ashlands Nature Reserve.
Pill is a village in North Somerset, England, situated on the southern bank of the Avon, about 4 miles (6 km) north-west of Bristol city centre. The village is the largest settlement in the civil parish of Pill and Easton-in-Gordano. The former hamlets of Lodway and Ham Green are now contiguous with Pill, and the village of Easton in Gordano is nearby. The parish extends northwest beyond the M5 motorway to include the Royal Portbury Dock.
The Avonmouth Docks are part of the Port of Bristol, in England. They are situated on the northern side of the mouth of the River Avon, opposite the Royal Portbury Dock on the southern side, where the river joins the Severn estuary, within Avonmouth.
The Port of Bristol Police (PoBP) is a ports police force with responsibility to protect the port complexes and community situated at the mouth of the River Avon on the border between Bristol and Somerset. Officers are attested under powers in legislation derived from the Harbours, Docks and Piers Clauses Act 1847.
Sir David Charles Ord is a British businessman.
The Portishead Railway is a branch line railway running from Portishead in North Somerset to the main line immediately west of Bristol, England. It was constructed by the Bristol & Portishead Pier and Railway Company, but it was always operated by its main line neighbour, and was more usually thought of as the Portishead branch or the Portishead railway.
Portishead Power Station refers to a series of two coal and oil-fired power stations which operated in the dock area of Portishead in Somerset, South West England, between 1929 and 1982.
The Portway is a major road in the City of Bristol. It is part of the A4 and connects Bristol City Centre to the Avonmouth Docks and the M5 motorway via the Avon Gorge.
Pyronaut is a specialised form of fireboat known as a fire-float. It was built in 1934 by Charles Hill & Sons Ltd., Albion Dock Bristol, Yard No. 208. Registered number 333833. She is owned by Bristol Museums and based at M Shed in Bristol's Floating Harbour.
Portbury Ashlands which is now known as Portbury Wharf Nature Reserve is a nature reserve between Portishead and the Royal Portbury Dock in Somerset, England. It was formed from the redevelopment of the area of Portishead formerly occupied by two power stations. To the east of the harbour, an area known as "the Ashlands" was used for over 50 years to get rid of power station waste which was dumped into lagoons on the site.
Grahame Edgar Farr was a maritime historian, specialising in the history of ships and shipping in the south-west of England from the eighteenth century onwards. He also wrote about the history of the lifeboat.
Terence Charles Mordaunt is a British entrepreneur, chairman and co-owner of The Bristol Port Company.
Dochfour was launched in March 1810 at Bristol. She sent much of her career as a West Indiaman, sailing between Bristol and Grenada. She was wrecked in October 1846.