The Town Docks The Old Dock By the mid-1700s the overcrowding of ships on the River Hull, or Old Harbour, had reached such an extent that vessels were being damaged, in addition to causing delays in handling and shipping. Therefore, some tentative investigations were begun into expanding the facilities at Hull. It was not until the later 1760s that the Hull Corporation acted and employed surveyors to search for a suitable site for a new harbour. At the same time,
HM Customs sought an end to the need to inspect cargoes handled at the private wharves and wanted customs procedures incorporated into a new dock or wharf—a "legal quay". An initial survey by
Robert Mylne and
Joseph Robson recommended a new harbour on the east side of the River Hull. Though the established development on the east bank tended to preclude a new port there, the same interests were unwilling to see the focus of trade shift away from the west bank where they were already established. In the early 1770s,
John Grundy was contracted by agriculturalists owning land reliant on the drainage of the River Hull to assess the impact of the proposed new quay on the River Hull. Grundy's report of 1772 suggested either widening the river, or using the channel behind the
Hull Citadel, or the moat of the Hull town walls for both harbourage and drainage. Grundy also proposed the use of gates in the channel to afford both wet and dry docks. Reports were prepared on the cost (
John Wooler) and the effect on the river (
John Smeaton) of Grundy's proposal for a quay on the site of the town's moat. The dock was costed at between £55,000 and £60,000, and the quay between £11,000 and £12,000. Smeaton's report indicated no issues arising in terms of the flow of the river. After both reports had been provided in early 1773 the Corporation and Customs soon agreed to proceed with the plan. With limited opposition only on the grounds of the effect on drainage, an act for the construction was obtained in 1774. The Old Dock, the first dock in Hull, was built between 1775 and 1778 to a design by
Henry Berry and John Grundy, Jr.;
Luke Holt acted as resident engineer, appointed on John Smeaton's recommendation. As built the dock was long by wide, the lock long by wide at its extremities, and deep, the lock river basin was in dimension. The dock entrance was on the River Hull just south of North Bridge, It was officially named the Queen's Dock in 1855. The dock closed in 1930 and was sold to the Corporation for £100,000. It was subsequently infilled and converted to ornamental gardens known as
Queen's Gardens.
Humber Dock Since the entrance to the Old Dock was via the River Hull, there were still problems with ships accessing the dock through the crowded river. In 1781, a canal was proposed to connect the Old Dock to the Humber. In general, sea-borne trade was still growing. Customs commissioned three independent reports from
Thomas Morris,
William Jessop, and
Joseph Huddart on the siting of a second dock in 1793. All three considered a dock in the southern end of the ditch of the city walls, and a dock on the site of Hull Citadel, also known as the Garrison. Two reports recommended the new dock be sited in the town ditch and proposed a canal connecting the old and new dock. The Dock Company then commissioned
John Hudson and
John Longbotham to examine and cost a dock in the town ditch, as well as other improvements. There was some delay in making the new dock a reality, partly due to the lethargy of the Dock Company, but by 1802 a bill had been passed in Parliament for the construction of a second dock—again following the path of the City walls, this time from Hessle gate roughly northwards. John Rennie and
William Chapman were employed as engineers. They submitted an optimistic cost estimate for a dock in the town ditch with a basin onto the Humber of £84,000. Experience with the settlement and collapse of the old dock's walls led to more substantial construction of lock and dock walls, though some subsidence still occurred. The dock walls now stood on angled piled foundations, with the mass of the wall at a shallow angle to the vertical opposing the weight of earth behind. The lock base consisted of an inverted arch, a design also used on the rebuilt Old Dock lock of 1814. During the construction of the lock pit a freshwater spring was found, causing difficulties in construction. The spring continued to cause problems in the lock pit, with some subsidence attributed to it (1812);
James Walker directed further remedial work on the lock in 1830 as a result.
John Harrap was the on site engineer. Construction began in 1803 and was completed in 1809 at a cost of £220,000. Mud from the excavations was used to make new ground on the banks of the Humber, with the upper clay stratum also used to manufacture bricks for the works. The dock entrance was from the Humber via an outer basin with piers. The dock itself was long and wide, the lock was long and wide. The depth of water varied from seasonally depending on the tides. The lock was crossed by a two leaf
swing bridge, in total length, and wide, made of cast iron, by Ayden and Etwell, with six main ribs supporting the roadway. The dock was first filled with water on 3 December 1808 and was formally opened on 30 June 1809. The cost of construction was split between the Dock Company, the Hull Corporation and Hull Trinity House, as set out in the text of the 1802 act. Humber Dock closed in 1968, it re-opened in 1983 as the
Hull Marina.), are now listed structures. The swing bridge (Wellington Street Bridge) was restored in 2007.
Junction Dock shopping centre on the Junction Dock One stipulation of the
Kingston-upon-Hull Docks Act 1802 (
42 Geo. 3. c. xci) for the construction of Humber Dock was that the Dock Company would build a third dock between the Old and Humber docks when the average tonnage of goods unloaded at the docks reached a certain level. This condition was satisfied in 1825. The required act of Parliament had already been passed – the
Docks, Kingston upon Hull Act 1824 (
5 Geo. 4. c. 52) – and construction of the third dock began in 1826. This dock, Junction Dock, was constructed between, and connected to the Old and Humber Docks. This made the old town of Hull an island bounded by the three docks, a river and an estuary, The dock walls were similar in design to those of Humber Dock, as were the locks, with inverted, arched bottoms. While the
cofferdam used in the construction of the northern lock was being dismantled a leak caused the undermining and collapse of around of the Old dock wall; the removal of debris was done using a
diving bell, and the wall repaired with piling. The dock opened in 1829 and was long and wide, with a lock at each end wide with a bridge over each. The bridges were of the balanced lifting type; both bridges and locks were from Hunter and English (Bow, London), with iron from
Alfreton, Derbyshire. In 1855, it was renamed Prince's Dock in honour of a visit by
Queen Victoria and
Albert, Prince Consort. The dock closed in 1968. Part of the dock still exists but without a lock connection to Humber Dock. The
Princes Quay shopping centre, opened in 1991,
Railway Dock The Dock Company applied to build a new branch dock in May 1844, and obtained powers with the
Kingston-upon-Hull Docks Act 1844 (
7 & 8 Vict. c. ciii), which also enabled the construction of an east dock (later Victoria Dock). In late 1844, the company applied to expand the branch dock, which was enabled by the '''''' (
8 & 9 Vict. c. v). The Railway Dock was connected on the west side of the Humber Dock to the north of Kingston Street and was smaller than the other town docks. The dock of , approximately was constructed at a cost of £106,000. It opened on 3 December 1846. The Dock Company's engineer was
J. B. Hartley, also the engineer on the east dock. Its primary purpose was for the transfer of goods to and from the newly built Hull and Selby Railway,
Victoria Dock After the construction of Junction Dock in 1825, the port and its trade continued to grow substantially, leading to the requirement for a new dock. In 1838, an independent company, the Queen's Dock Company, was formed to promote a new dock. The new dock, of around , to be called the Queen's Dock, was designed by
James Oldham for a site of around in
Drypool east of the River Hull and
The Citadel and near the river's confluence with the Humber. The proposed dock had entrances onto the Humber and the Hull. Capital of £180,000 was proposed for the scheme. Proceedings for a bill in Parliament were begun in 1838. The Queen's Dock Company abandoned the project, after the Dock Company took up a similar proposal. In September 1839 James Walker was asked to design plans for a dock, and proceedings for a bill in Parliament were begun at the end of that year. The dock's main aim was to accommodate the increased timber trade, freeing up the town docks; alternative plans were also considered including a west dock, and the conversion of the Old Harbour (River Hull) into a dock. Walker's dock was broadly similar to the built dock, with entrances onto both the Humber and the River Hull. The design allowed for an extension to the east with timber ponds at a later date. The 1840 bill was withdrawn due to local opposition. In 1844, the company returned again to Parliament with a bill for a dock in the same location, as well as other works including the Railway Dock. Permission to build the new east dock, and railway dock was granted in 1844; construction of this new dock began in 1845 and was completed in 1850 at a cost of £300,000. The Dock Company's engineer for this project was J. B. Hartley; the plan was similar in overall form to that of James Walker's design. The formal laying of the foundation stone took place on 5 November 1845, and the formal opening on 3 July 1850, with the dock given the name Victoria Dock, in honour of
Queen Victoria. The dock had an area of about , with the Half Tide Basin , the outer basin onto the Humber , and the Drypool Basin . In some respects the dock was of a slightly larger design than Walker's 1840 proposal. The water depth was (spring to neap tide), and the entrances to the Humber and the Hull River were wide respectively. There were two entrances. The larger entrance was onto the Humber. From an outer basin it led via two parallel locks to the Half Tide Basin, and then to the dock itself. The second entrance was onto the River Hull south of the entrance to the Old Dock and of Drypool Bridge; it had an outer lock which opened directly to a second locked area known as Drypool Basin. The first timber pond was added soon after the construction of the dock. In 1845, the
York, Hull and East and West Yorkshire Junction Railway proposed a railway line from
York to Hull which was to terminate at the East Dock. As a consequence, the
York and North Midland Railway (Y&NMR) was forced to bring forward its own scheme to connect the east dock to the railway network. The Y&NMR's
Victoria Dock Branch Line was opened in 1853. In 1863, the dock itself was expanded eastwards by , plus another timber pond (No. 2) of east of the dock. The original timber pond (No. 1) east of the Half Tide Basin was extended through land reclaimed from the Humber. and later by
Cook, Welton & Gemmell (from 1883 to 1902).
C. & W. Earle also had shipbuilding facilities (established 1851) on the banks of the Humber adjacent to and south of Victoria Dock. Part of the north-west corner of the eastern timber pond (No. 2) was filled in because of changes to the railway layout north of the dock. By the second half of the 20th century, both ponds had been filled in creating timber yards and sidings; this pattern of use was retained until closure. One major use of the dock was for the trade in timber. There were also facilities for cattle imports including abattoirs and cold storage; coal was also exported through the dock. The Dock closed in the 1970s and was infilled. The land was used for the construction of a housing estate in the late 1980s. The entrance basin to the dock on the Humber part remains though it is permanently sealed. Both the Albert and William Wright docks were closed to commercial vessels in 1972 and converted for use as fish docks. The Hull fish fleet moved to the docks in 1975. as well as being the landing point for the much reduced Hull fishing industry. As a result, a flood defence improvement scheme was brought forward by two years; work on the £6.3 million flood defence improvement including a long wall high began in November 2014; the wall was completed by November 2015.
William Wright Dock While the Albert Dock was still under construction, the Dock Company obtained another act in 1866 allowing the extension of the dock westwards, and an 1867 Act that allowed further expansion to the west and south. Construction began in 1873, with R. A. Marillier as engineer and John Hawkshaw as consulting engineer. The dock was planned as an extension of the Albert Dock accessed via a channel. The foundation stone was formally laid by William Wright in 1876. The dock opened in 1880 and was named William Wright Dock after the chairman of the Dock Company. The 2013 storm surge (Cyclone Xaver) caused damage to the north-western wall of the dock—as a result Associated British Ports (ABP) sought to infill approximately of the dock as a repair.
Riverside Quay In 1904, the North Eastern Railway (NER), then the main owner of the Hull docks, applied to Parliament for powers to build a quay along the bank of the Humber Estuary, adjacent to its Albert Dock, and related works. Permission was obtained in 1905 to construct a quay of up to in length, and to dredge to a depth of below the low water level of ordinary spring tides. The quay was designed as a deep water quay for foodstuffs and other goods requiring rapid handling. It avoided delays in entering locks, or having to wait for a low tide to turn. Additional works included construction of a two-storey warehouse for the fruit trade on the adjacent side of the Albert Dock, and the replacement of the single line railway swing bridge over the dock's entrance with a double track bridge. A quay of was constructed along the timbered wharf outward from Albert Dock, extending around farther into the estuary. The construction consisted of a bank of Middlesbrough slag around in depth deposited abutting the former quay wall, with about a 45° facing slope supported at the base by sheet piling. The quay's remaining support was formed on
Blue Gum and
Pitch pine timber pilings, spaced around . The long Blue Gum piles extended above ground level to form the supports for the structure's roof. As built, the quay was equipped with hydraulically powered capstans for shunting, and electric cranes; a water supply for ship supply and fire fighting was fitted, and gas lighting used. The electrical equipment was supplied by
Craven Brothers. Hydraulic power was supplied via an
accumulator tower which also functioned as a
clock tower The pier also incorporated a passenger station for continental boat trains. The quay came into use in 1907. Initial operations were by the
Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) and NER's joint ferry to
Zeebrugge, followed by ships to Norway operated by
Wilson Line, and to Rotterdam by the
Hull and Netherlands Steamship Company. The quay was fully completed by 1911. In the Second World War
Hull Blitz, the quay was destroyed by fires started by enemy bombing in May 1941. In the 1950s, a new long concrete quay was constructed and officially opened in 1959.
St Andrew's Dock St Andrew's Dock was constructed at the same time as the extension of Albert Dock. The initial scheme was for a dock, in length, entered from the Humber by a long by wide lock. As with the Albert Dock extension, the engineers were Marillier and Hawkshaw. The dock was opened in 1883, directly to the west of William Wright Dock, with an area of over . Originally intended to be used for coal handling, it was used entirely for the fishing industry. While under construction, a cofferdam at the west end burst. This resulted in practically every vessel in the dock being damaged. The £20,000 damages included the destruction of three steamers and three other vessels. The cause was thought to be underground springs released during the pile driving and excavations. In the late 1930s, plans were made for improvements and expansion at the dock. By 1938 the major part of the plans had been postponed, with no expansion of the dock. In 1947, discussions about improvements to the dock's slipways were resumed, but no work was done. The dock was in use until 1975 when the fishing industry was moved to Albert Dock at which point it closed. Partial filling in of the dock began in the 1980s. The western part has been redeveloped into the St Andrews Quay retail park, while the eastern part of the dock around the entrance was declared a
conservation area in 1990 because of its social historic interest. In 2013, the charity St Andrew's Dock Heritage Park Action Group (STAND) selected a design for a memorial to the 6,000 Hull trawlermen who lost their lives in the fishing industry, to be sited next to the Humber at the dock.
Alexandra Dock The Alexandra Dock was built between 1881 and 1885 on land reclaimed from the Humber as part of developments built by the Hull Barnsley & West Riding Junction Railway and Dock Company. Its design was by
James Abernethy, and carried out by a partnership of engineers
James Oldham and
George Bohn, with
A. C. Hurtzig as resident engineer. The contractors were
Lucas and Aird. The dock machinery, including lock gates and unloading equipment, was hydraulically powered and supplied by
Armstrong, Mitchell & Company. Pumping machines for the dry docks, and to regulate the water level of the main dock were supplied by
Gwynne and Company (London)—two high pressure condensing engines drove
centrifugal pumps, the engines powered by six
Lancashire boilers. The dock was built to the east of Victoria Dock with an outlet to the Humber. Water to fill the dock came from the
Holderness Drain, which was intended to minimise the silting up of the dock that would be caused by ingress of water from the Humber. The dock had an area of , on a site of of which was on land within the tidal range of the Humber, requiring the construction of a embankment to reclaim the land. Steam and hydraulically powered equipment was used to aid the construction of the dock. In 1899, the dock was expanded by , officially opened on 25 September 1899. The extended area added approximately of quayside and was built to the same depth as the earlier dock, with the dock walls now constructed of concrete. The contractor was Whitaker and Sons of Horsforth, Leeds, under R. Pawley of the H&BR. The extension was originally fitted for the handling of coal and pit props, with four coal hoists. A pier onto the Humber Estuary (West Wharf) was added in 1911, the pier was long with an minimum depth of water at spring tides and was equipped with electric conveyors for the transportation of coal. Alexandra Dock closed in 1982, at which time the connection to the rail network was removed. In 1991, the dock re-opened In the early 1990s, part of the port land was developed as a dredged aggregate marine terminal and plant, operated as Humber Sand and Gravel Co. (est. 1993), a joint venture between
Hanson (formerly ARC) and
CEMEX. a concrete batching plant was built on the dock land in the late 1990s for Ready Mix Concrete Ltd. (later CEMEX UK Materials). In the 1990s, development of a riverside container terminal, Quay 2000, was proposed. The scheme, later named
Quay 2005, was to be built at the site of the West Wharf. A public enquiry was required, due to objections from residents of the
Victoria Dock Village. The inspector recommended refusal of the scheme, but the decision was over-ruled by the
Department of Transport, and the project gained approved in December 2005. The
Associated British Ports (Hull) Harbour Revision Order 2006 (
SI 2006/1135) allowing the work came into effect in 2006. Construction of the facility, renamed Hull Riverside Container Terminal, was initially planned to be complete by 2008; construction of the terminal was delayed, and the scheme was later adapted to attract an offshore wind power business to the port. (See
§ Green Port Hull.) As of 2010 the dock handled cargoes including aggregates, bulk agricultural products, bulk chemicals and wood, and also had a
Ro-Ro terminal. Infrastructure for the proposed development would also make use of the planned Quay 2005 riverside facilities, which had already gained planning consent, and had an extant
environmental mitigation at
Chowder Ness. The site was favoured because of its relative proximity to planned large-scale wind farms in the
North Sea (
Dogger Bank,
Hornsea, and
East Anglia Array wind farms), and the presence of existing port infrastructure. The Quay 2005 scheme included reclamation of of land west of the dock entrance, on the banks of the
Humber Estuary. In the original scheme the reclaimed area was roughly a right
trapezoid which projected well over into the Humber, with a south facing front of over ; the instrument also allowed dredging of the quay and approaches of up to below
chart datum. The development, Green Port Hull, included the Quay 2005 estuary wharf, repurposed as a facility for wind turbine logistics. It also required the infilling of the dock west of the lock gates with about of material to create additional land for operations. The initial plan included a
nacelle factory of up to , plus office, warehousing, and external storage areas, as well as a
helipad and a wind turbine of up to 6 MW. The works were to take up most of the dock area except for land around, and including, dry dock facilities in the north-east corner. Businesses located in the dock were to be relocated, primarily to other sites within the Port of Hull. Initial expectations were for construction to begin in 2012 and the facility to be operational by 2014. The conclusion of the agreement was delayed because of planning issues and uncertainties over the UK's renewable energy policy. Relocation of existing businesses had taken place by 2012. The Siemens and ABP 2011 MOU agreement was finalised in March 2014. ABP investment in the port facilities was estimated at £150 million, and Siemens investment at £160 million across the two sites. The facility was expected to become operational between 2016 and 2017. Plans for the turbine factory were submitted and approved in 2014. The contract (about £100 million) for dock civil engineering work was awarded to a joint venture of
GRAHAM and
Lagan Construction Group, with
CH2M Hill as consulting engineers. Official
groundbreaking took place in January 2015. Revised plans for the site submitted in April 2015 included only a blade manufacturing factory at the site, together with storage and other logistics facilities for wind farm installation work, with no nacelle production.
VolkerFitzpatrick was awarded the contract to construct the blade factory in July 2015.
Clugston Group was contracted to construct an associated service and logistics building in September 2015. As part of the development, the Dead Bod graffiti, painted by Captain Len (Pongo) Rood in the 1960s on one of the West Wharf buildings, which had become a landmark to Humber shipping, was removed and saved for posterity. In early 2017, after restoration, the Dead Bod was temporarily removed to the
Humber Street Gallery in Hull as part of the
City of Culture 2017 celebrations. The blade factory was formally inaugurated in the presence of
Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy,
Greg Clark on 1 December 2016. The factory scheme has an expected lifespan of around 30 years, after which the site would be returned to general port use. In August 2021, Siemans announced that a £186 million investment would be made in doubling the size of blade factory to handle larger blade sizes in excess of in length. The scheme was expected for completion by 2023.
Hull Joint Dock The NER began planning for a rival dock east of Alexandra Dock in the 1890s. This led eventually to a joint agreement between the NER and the Hull and Barnsley Railway (HBR), and the Hull Dock Company, the
Hull Joint Dock Act 1899 (
62 & 63 Vict. c. ccxlii). Construction of the dock was delayed until 1906 and was completed in 1914, at which point the new dock became officially known as the King George Dock. An extension arm of the dock to the south-east, sharing the same lock, was opened as the Queen Elizabeth Dock in 1969. In 1993, the dock gained a terminal outside the lock gates, on the banks of the Humber, known as River Terminal 1. It is now known as Rotterdam Terminal, used by
North Sea Ferries.
King George Dock (1914–) By the early 1890s further expansion of the port facilities at Hull were required, in particular dock and handling facilities for large coal carrying vessels, as well as facilities for the new
steam trawlers. The NER had been in discussion with the Hull Dock Company regarding investment and working arrangements, this led to a takeover of the Dock Company by the NER. In 1892, the board of the NER had decided that a greater investment of around £1,000,000 in a new dock east of Alexandra Dock would be better spent than expending a smaller sum, of around £22,000, on expanding the entrance to the Dock Company's Albert Dock. It put bills before Parliament for the amalgamation of the Dock Company, and for a new dock. Both bills were rejected; the amalgamation bill was resubmitted in 1893, with clauses protecting the interests of the Hull and Barnsley Railway (HBR), which feared the possibility of a rival dock adjacent to their own
Alexandra Dock. As such, the bill contained clauses requiring the NER to inform the HBR of any planned dock to the east and allow them the option to join as partners in any such development. The
North Eastern Railway (Hull Docks) Act 1893 (
56 & 57 Vict. c. cxcviii) was passed, and the amalgamation took place in 1893. The NER submitted bills for extensive dock improvements in Hull in 1897, and again in 1898 with an expanded improvement scheme, both of which were abandoned over responsibilities regarding dredging the river. The following year the NER submitted a bill for a new dock east of Alexandra, jointly with the HBR, including new connecting rail lines—this was passed as the
Hull Joint Dock Act 1899 (
62 & 63 Vict. c. ccxlii). The two companies estimated (1899) the cost of the development at £1,419,555, of which the dock and lock were estimated at £1,194,160; the scheme was expected to take seven years to complete. The act had specified a dock of which was expected to have been completed by 1906. The initial construction was reduced to due to the high cost of the tenders received for the original design. The
Hull Joint Dock Act 1906 (
6 Edw. 7. c. xlvi), made minor modifications to the original scheme, and extended the time for the construction of the dock. At the same time, the
Great Central Railway's rival,
Immingham Dock, was under construction on the south bank of the Humber. Most of the dock site was beyond the bank of the Humber as it then existed, requiring reclamation of ground from the Humber foreshore. Two temporary banks were constructed, enclosing , plus a timber dam beyond the southernmost bank closing off the soon-to-be-constructed lock. Due to underground water pressure, the underlying glacial geology of the Humber was weak, containing strata of quicksand. By early 1911 the embankments enclosing the new dock area were nearly complete. as were most of the excavations for the dock itself, and the dock's walls. The dock's lock required insertion of steel sheet piles as far as below the bottom of the lock to create a watertight surround for the construction, as a result of water containing gravel in the underlying geology. The dock walls were of concrete, faced and coped with
Staffordshire blue bricks and granite. Some dock walls were built as sloped constructions, with
blue gum timber wharfing, due to poor ground conditions preventing satisfactory foundations. As built in 1914, the dock had a water area of and consisted of a central area of around connected to the river by a lock running north-east to south-west. Two main arms to the north-east and north-west were initially constructed, both around long. The western arm had warehousing facilities, while the central and eastern part of the northernmost quay had six coaling berths designed to allow ships to dock diagonally at the dockside. The main lock was itself long divided into two sections of by another set of gates. Water depth in the lock would be between between low water and high spring tides, while the dock itself was to be maintained at a minimum depth of . The design allowed for expansion through two further arms to the south-east and south-west, giving a potential ultimate area of around . Two graving docks were sited at the eastern end of the north-eastern arm of and , each with a water depth of up to . Much of the dock equipment was operated by electricity, supplied at 440 V from
Hull Corporation, including electric coal conveyors, cranes, and dock lighting, as well as powering pumps used to supply hydraulic power. Hydraulic equipment (from
Hathorn Davey of Leeds) was used for lock and dry dock gates, and for the coal tippers. Cranes were supplied by
Royce Limited (Manchester), Craven Brothers, and a floating crane by
Werfo Gusto (
A. F. Smulders); coal handling equipment was from
Head Wrightson. The machinery and mechanism for the lock gates were manufactured by the
Hydraulic Engineering Company (Chester); the centrifugal pumps and electric motors for draining the dry docks were made by
W. H. Allen of Bedford. On 26 June 1914,
King George V visited Hull and formally opened the Hull Joint Dock. The dock was subsequently named King George Dock in his honour. Its construction was supervised by
T. M. Newell and
R. Pawley, with
W. Ebdon as resident engineer, and T. L. Norfolk as superintendent of equipment construction. Architectural design of the dock's offices was by the NER's architect
William Bell. The dock was home, for a period of time, to the NER's
Pals Battalion, the
17th Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers. The battalion arrived for training at the dock on 22 September 1914. In November 1914, the battalion moved to stations along the East Yorkshire coast, with the headquarters remaining at the docks. On 20 June 1915, the battalion left the docks for
Catterick. A
ferro-concrete grain silo was under construction in 1914 at the end of the north-western quay and was complete by 1919. In 1959, the British Transport Commission authorised a £4,750,000 improvement scheme for the dock. The largest part of the scheme (£2,000,000) was the extension of the north quay by the total removal of coal loading equipment, and conversion of the
echelon (diagonal) berthing arrangement on the far north and north-east dock walls into standard straight dockside. Other improvements included replacement of timber quay structures with concrete ones (specifically the south-west arm), over of storage in single-storey sheds, new electric cranes, and additional grain handling equipment, as well as investment in mobile mechanical handling equipment including
fork lift trucks and
mobile cranes. Also included in the works were expansion of the grain silo capacity and an impounding station designed to maintain the dock water at a high level. In 1965, the creation of berths for use by
roll-on roll-off ferries began, increasing use of the dock for unit freight transport.
Recent history (1970–) A container terminal was opened in 1971 at Queen Elizabeth Dock. Two roll on-roll off terminals were opened in 1973 and by 1975 there were six such terminals in the two docks. In 1984,
Anglia Oils (now
AarhusKarlshamn) opened an automated
vegetable oil refinery on the King George Dock estate.
PD Ports (originally Humberside Sea and Land Services) began operating the Hull Container Terminal in 1990. By the mid-2000s throughput was over 100,000
TEU per annum, with
Samskip as the primary customer. In 1993, River Terminal 1, a terminal for large roll-on roll-off vessels, constructed at a cost of £12 million, opened on the banks of the Humber Estuary south of the King George Dock. A covered terminal was opened in 1997, initially built for steel handling for
British Steel Corporation. It was renamed Hull All-Weather Terminal in 2009, and the facilities were expanded to allow the handling of other weather sensitive goods, including dry bulks, paper, and agribulks (fertiliser). A covered shed for paper products (Finland Terminal), opened in 2000, had expanded to by 2006. In 2001, new facilities were inaugurated on the banks of the Humber. The Rotterdam Terminal (on the site of the 1993 River Terminal 1), was built at a cost of £14.3 million to serve the
P&O North Sea Ferries' new ships, the
Pride of Rotterdam and
Pride of Hull, used on the Hull-Rotterdam route. The 1919 grain silo was demolished in 2010–11. As of 2010, other facilities at the two docks included a cold store and passenger services to Zeebrugge. The company AarhusKarlshamn operates a large vegetable-based oil products processing plant at the dock, and the Kingston Terminal at the south-east of Queen Elizabeth Dock is used for import of coal products. In 2010, there were ten roll on-roll off berths within the two docks. In 2013, a per year capacity sea to rail biomass facility, with a silo was constructed to supply
Drax power station. The facility was officially opened by Councillor Mary Glew,
Lord Mayor of Hull, in December 2014. A 160 by 390 foot (50 by 120 m) specialised biomass dry bulk warehouse was opened in late 2015. ==Other facilities==