Many changes in 103 years of shipping

Press, 27 February 1980, Page 16

Many changes in 103 years of shipping

In the 103 years since the Lyttelton Harbour Board was set up to take over the running of the port when the Canterbury Provincial Government was abolished, it has had to meet many changes in the size and nature of ships, the pattern of trade and competition from other ports.

What has been achieved has been guided by men with a sense of community service, backed by business acumen and a staff which has matched ability and experience with a loyalty demonstrated by long-service records. The constitution and number of members have been changed several times; but one thing has made the board a good local body to serve — politics disappear after an election.

The board of 1877 saw as its first duty the deepening of berths and approaches to the wharves. Dredging was given priority over pressures for a graving dock and more reclaimed land for storage sheds and railway lines. Only when it had seen the dredging programme under way did the board embark on wharf extensions, buildings, a patent slip and the graving dock, which was opened in 1883. Early boards had difficult financial times. The business community pressured for a lowering of charges, which was granted, then came retrenchment and dredging plant was laid up. The slump of the eighties, which was to last until 1897, affected the board and the whole community. At the turn of the century the board began a new dredging scheme to deepen the inner harbour and create a 152 m wide channel in the outer harbour to a depth of 8.19 m at low water. Today, the depth is more than 11m. With better times, the board was able to develop and extend the wharves, buy a new tug, the Canterbury, in 1906 when it was the most powerful in Australasia, and begin the Naval Point reclamation in 1909. The tug Canterbury, was subsequently renamed Lyttelton to make way for the board’s new suction dredge. She was later joined by Lyttelton 11, in

1939, and ultimately replaced by another tug, Canterbury, in 1971. But the arguments, Port Christchurch versus development of Lyttelton and a road tunnel, were to continue right through the first half of this century. Canal. enthusiasts were few in number by the time of the Second World War, but Canterbury was still divided on major issues; and it was not until the early 50s that authority was given for a road tunnel and 1961 before work began. The railway tunnel, built with pick and shovel crver six years from 1861, a tremendous achievement for a new settlement, had been the only means of getting goods to and from the port except for the winding and steep Evans Pass road, but even then the port was Railway-con-trolled.

Criticism of bottlenecks was never-ending and there was a continued cry of shortage of waggons at busy times. It was not until 1954 that road carriers could use the wharves, and then only for fruit cargoes. All this came to an end with the road tunnel opening in 1964, road access to the inner harbour and the opening of the eastern extension, with its large transit sheds, . parking space and reclaimed land so vital to prepare Lyttelton for the container age.

Earlier important events of the board’s history in this century were .the reconstruction of Gladstone Pier in 1925 and the delivery in 1926 of the 80-ton craneship Rapaki, still in use today and with a record of war service — it' was sent to the Pacific in 1942.

Petroleum products, today are a major part of the port’s trade. The trade began when the Vacuum Oil Company’s chartered Lincoln Ellsworth pumped ashore 4,166,651 litres of petrol in October, 1927. Storage tanks, now a port landmark, had begun to appear on the reclaimed land.

In the same year the board provided storage for grain and produce. This w’as in keeping with the board’s continuing encouragement to primary producers to use the port. As early as 1890 it had built cool stores.

To promote quality exports, the board presents, ed a cheese challenge cup, won for the first crt many times by the Barry’s Bay factory in 1932, and three years later an export lamb cup.

Hit a second lime by a World War, the board bad to curtail reconstruction .work and reduce staff in the 19405. and after the war the board and the port were plagued by recurring industrial troubles which culminated in the 1951 waterfront strike. But an air of confidence was being felt. The board realised that the people, of Canterbury and Christchurch were looking to it to help them to a better second half of the 20th Century, and it responded with imaginative planning to keep Lyttelton to the forefront of New Zealand ports.

In 1954 the board sought legislation for. a S7M development of the outer harbour east of Gladstone Pier, approved a replacement dredge and bought land in the city for its own office and administration building. Although the board’s earliest meetings were at the port, over the years it has looked on itself as being a Canterbury local authority and from 1879 has had offices in the city, for many years right in Cathedral Square, including for 39 years rooms in the old Tramway Board’s building. Its new building at the corner of Madras Street and Chester Street was opened in 1959, the same year that a contract was let for a five-storeyed office block in Lyttelton which gave the port building line a Vastly new look.

Meantime there was a busy and exciting programme of testing for the eastern harbour extension, including model tests at a hydraulic research station in Britain, the quarry to provide the rock fill was being developed and a new dredge, the Peraki, was ordered. An elevated roadway over the railway line in Oxford Street was yet another reminder that road traffic from the tunnel being blasted through from Heathcote . would soon be on the wharves.

Finally in 1964 trucks and cars flowed through the tunnel and Cashin Quay was opened. No longer could there be talk of a Railways’ stranglehold. In the same year the board embarked on facilities for .roll-on ships for the inter-island- steamer express service, the historic link with the North Island from 1895, which must to the board’s regret, as far as passengers were concerned, came to an end.

As well as roll-on ships for the New Zealand and Australian trade, other new types of ships were emerging. The cellular container ships were no longer seen as the. be-all and end-all once hailed as their role.

Huge bulk carriers for coal, coke, phosphates and woodchips were coming on the scene and L.A.S.H. vessels were also appearing. Lyttelton had to be ready for them.

While the board was always confident that it would be designated as a container port, and planned to that end, there were some delays and frustrations.

However, it could not be prevented from entering the new trades possible with bulk carriers. Bulk wheat silos were built in 1968, the first bulk coke cargo went to Noumea a year later and was followed shortly after bv plans for the stock-pil-ing and bulk shipment of wood chips to Japan, now an established trade from a new industry for Canterbury.

Other bulk shipments out of the port have been barley, and West Coast coal for Japan, while inward bulk cargoes have included phosphate rock, sulphur and potash, gypsum, molasses and methanol.

In 1974 the New Zealand Ports Authority announced that Lyttelton and Port Chalmers were to be developed as container ports but the way was still not clear. Strong campaigns from the South and some parochial lobbying had to be met before April, 1975, when Lyttelton was given Ministerial approval as the first South Island container port, and advised to have the initial facilities operational from early in its centennial year, 1977. This meant some all-out work efforts; but the foundations had been well-laid by planning which at times had to be pigeonholed in frustration so the Lyttelton Harbour Board was well prepared to meet its centennial challenge. Not all the board’s work over the vears has been concerned ' with providing bigger and better facilities for the unloading of imports which flow to every part of the South Island and the sending away of Canterbury’s farm produce and manufactured exports, although this has necessarily been the board’s first'priority.

Lyttelton has a firm place in Antarctic history for it was the port from which Scott and Shacklewent south on their expeditions. Since the 1950 s the board has to provide for the modern Antarctic ships, the United States icebreakers and supply ships and the New Zealand Antarctic ship, Discovery.

The board has provided facilities for yachtsmen and other small craft owners and is the con-

trolling authority for recreation areas around the harbour.

The people of the area served by the board — from the Rangitata in the south to the Conway in the north — are encouraged to know about the working of their port.

In 1934, the board initiated visits around the harbour, the fist being made by a group of young farmers, and since the 1940 s has encouraged visits by school children. Now about 4000 or 5000 a year see for themselves how the board provides the links with the rest of the world. Another link with the past for port visitors is the time-ball station, one of the last buildings to be ordered by the Provincial Government before the board took over.