A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manchester and Duluth; these access the sea via rivers or canals. Because of their roles as ports of entry for immigrants as well as soldiers in wartime, many port cities have experienced dramatic multi-ethnic and multicultural changes throughout their histories.
A pier is a raised structure that rises above a body of water and usually juts out from its shore, typically supported by piles or pillars, and provides above-water access to offshore areas. Frequent pier uses include fishing, boat docking and access for both passengers and cargo, and oceanside recreation. Bridges, buildings, and walkways may all be supported by architectural piers. Their open structure allows tides and currents to flow relatively unhindered, whereas the more solid foundations of a quay or the closely spaced piles of a wharf can act as a breakwater, and are consequently more liable to silting. Piers can range in size and complexity from a simple lightweight wooden structure to major structures extended over 1,600 m (5,200 ft). In American English, a pier may be synonymous with a dock.
A dockworker is a waterfront manual laborer who is involved in loading and unloading ships.
The word dock in American English refers to one or a group of human-made structures that are involved in the handling of boats or ships. In British English, the term is not used the same way as in American English, it is used to mean the area of water that is next to or around a wharf or quay. The exact meaning varies among different variants of the English language.
A merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are used for military purposes.
A lighter is a type of flat-bottomed barge used to transfer goods and passengers to and from moored ships. Lighters were traditionally unpowered and were moved and steered using long oars called "sweeps" and the motive power of water currents. They were operated by skilled workers called lightermen and were a characteristic sight in London's docks until about the 1960s, when technological changes made this form of lightering largely redundant. Unpowered lighters continue to be moved by powered tugs, however, and lighters may also now themselves be powered. The term is also used in the Lighter Aboard Ship (LASH) system.
The Port of Hong Kong located by the South China Sea, is a deepwater seaport dominated by trade in containerised manufactured products, and to a lesser extent raw materials and passengers. A key factor in the economic development of Hong Kong, the natural shelter and deep waters of Victoria Harbour provide ideal conditions for berthing and the handling of all types of vessels. It is one of the busiest ports in the world, in the three categories of shipping movements, cargo handled and passengers carried. This makes Hong Kong a Large-Port Metropolis.
A bulk carrier or bulker is a merchant ship specially designed to transport unpackaged bulk cargo—such as grain, coal, ore, steel coils, and cement—in its cargo holds. Since the first specialized bulk carrier was built in 1852, economic forces have led to increased size and sophistication of these ships. Today's bulk carriers are specially designed to maximize capacity, safety, efficiency, and durability.
A dry bulk cargo barge is a barge designed to carry freight such as coal, ores, grain, sand or gravel, or similar materials. Barges are usually constructed of steel. They have an outer hull, and one or more internal holds. A rake barge has a bow shaped to cause less resistance when being pushed and is usually placed at the head of the tow. A box barge has no rake to the ends and is usually placed in the center and rear of the tow and can hold more cargo.
A gantry crane is a crane built atop a gantry, which is a structure used to straddle an object or workspace. They can range from enormous "full" gantry cranes, capable of lifting some of the heaviest loads in the world, to small shop cranes, used for tasks such as lifting automobile engines out of vehicles. They are also called portal cranes, the "portal" being the empty space straddled by the gantry.
The Port of Ashdod is one of Israel's three main cargo ports. The port is located in Ashdod, about 40 kilometers south of Tel Aviv, adjoining the mouth of the Lachish River. Its establishment significantly enhanced the country's port capacity. It handles the largest volume of cargo containers annually of all Israeli ports. Ships carrying humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip also unload their cargo at Ashdod.
Marine architecture is the design of architectural and engineering structures which support coastal design, near-shore and off-shore or deep-water planning for many projects such as shipyards, ship transport, coastal management or other marine and/or hydroscape activities. These structures include harbors, lighthouses, marinas, oil platforms, offshore drillings, accommodation platforms and offshore wind farms, floating engineering structures and building architectures or civil seascape developments. Floating structures in deep water may use suction caisson for anchoring.
The Port of Haydarpaşa, also known as the Port of Haidar Pasha or the Port of Istanbul, is a general cargo seaport, ro-ro and container terminal, situated in Haydarpaşa, Istanbul, Turkey at the southern entrance to the Bosphorus, near Haydarpaşa Station. It is operated by the Turkish State Railways (TCDD) and serves a hinterland which includes the country's most industrialised areas.
The Port of Southampton is a passenger and cargo port in the central part of the south coast of England. The modern era in the history of the Port of Southampton began when the first dock was inaugurated in 1843. After the Port of Felixstowe, Southampton is the second largest container terminal in UK, with a handled traffic of 1.5 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU). It also handles cruise ships, roll-on roll-off, dry bulk, and liquid bulk.
In shipping, break-bulk, breakbulk, or break bulk cargo, also called general cargo, is goods that are stowed on board ships in individually counted units. Traditionally, the large numbers of items are recorded on distinct bills of lading that list them by different commodities. This is in contrast to cargo stowed in modern intermodal containers as well as bulk cargo, which goes directly, unpackaged and in large quantities, into a ship's hold(s), measured by volume or weight.
The term shipping terminal may apply to facilities where loading and unloading of people or goods takes place:
Port of Baku is a sea port located in the Bay of Baku, on the coast of city of Baku, Azerbaijan. The main entrance faces the Neftchiler Avenue.
Lekki Deep Sea Port, is a multi-purpose, deep sea port in the Lagos Free Zone and is the only currently operating deep sea port in the country, having started full commercial operations in April 2023.
Mundra Port is India's first private port, largest container port and largest commercial port, located on the northern shores of the Gulf of Kutch near Mundra, Kutch district, Gujarat. Formerly operated by Mundra Port and Special Economic Zone Limited (MPSEZ) owned by Adani Group, it was later expanded into Adani Ports & SEZ Limited (APSEZ) managing several ports. In FY 2020–21, Mundra Port handled 144.4 million tonnes of cargo. The port currently handles over 155 MT, which constitutes nearly 11 per cent of India’s maritime cargo. The port also handles nearly 33 per cent of India’s container traffic.
Container port design process is a set of correlated practices considered during container port design, aiming to transfer general business mission into detailed design documents for future construction and operation.
