364 CHAPTER IX. TRANSIT SHEDS AND WAREHOUSES. EXTENT OF ACCOMMODATION REQUIRED-PROPORTION OF GOODS TO QUAYAGE-STATISTICS OF SAMPLE CARGOES-ACCESSIBILITY OF SHEDS-PROXIMITY TO EDGE OF QUAYLEVEL OF FLOOR-GENERAL DIVERSITY OF PRACTICE-FEATURES OF CONSTRUCTION— DOORS AND DOORWAYS-COMPARTMENTS - LIGHTING-MATERIALS FOR FLOORS FIRE-RESISTING CONSTRUCTION-MONIER, HENNEBIQUE, AND COTTANÇIN SYSTEMS— PRESSURE SUSTAINED BY FLOORS-COLUMNS AND PIERS-STRENGTH OF COLUMNSROOF COVERINGS WEIGHT OF SHED ROOFS - EXAMPLES OF SHEDS AND WAREHOUSES AT TILBURY, LIVERPOOL, DUNDEE, GREENOCK, GLASGOW, MANCHESTER, ANTWERP, ROTTERDAM, HAVRE, MARSEILLES, CALAIS, DUNKIRK, DIEPPE, ROUEN, BREMEN, HAMBURG, CALCUTTA, AND BUENOS AYRES. FEW articles of commerce are altogether unaffected by exposure to climatic conditions, and for by far the greater quantity of goods deposited on dock quays, some protection from the vicissitudes of the weather is absolutely essential. This is provided, in most cases, in the form of transit sheds and warehouses. The former class are for the temporary accommodation of discharged cargoes, or of freights on the eve of shipment. The latter class are for the reception of goods which, having reached their destination, are to be stored for periods of longer, and probably indefinite, duration. In bonded sheds and warehouses, dutiable articles may remain under customs' seal until such time as the consignee has need of them, the imposts meanwhile remaining in abeyance. Extent of Shed Accommodation. The area of quay space allocated to storage purposes will necessarily depend upon several considerations. It is not always practicable to provide shed accommodation commensurate with the cubic capacity of vessels frequenting the berths, neither is it, in other instances, essential or advisable to do so. Under certain circum. stances, goods may be removed from the quays almost, if not quite, as rapidly as they are discharged from the ship's hold. This happens when a cargo, even if not entirely homogeneous, is fairly uniform in character, and is consigned to but few individuals. When, on the other hand, goods have to be broken up and sorted into numerous lots, it becomes, even with the utmost expedition, a matter of several days before they can all be despatched to their several destinations. Accordingly, it is not unreasonable nor unusual, in such cases, to allow consignees a period of seventy-two to ninety-six hours in which to claim and remove their property. A further complication arises from the necessity of dealing, practically simultaneously, with outgoing goods. Deposited on the site ready for the SHED ACCOMMODATION. 365 reloading of a discharging vessel, they serve to decrease the amount of available quay space, and thus interfere with freedom and rapidity of movement. It is a good plan, where feasible, for a ship to discharge her inward freight at one berth, and then proceed to another to receive her outward consignments. * Mr. Hayter has laid it down as his opinion that 350 or, at the most, 400 tons of goods per lineal yard of quay can be dealt with per annum. But in the case of Liverpool, of British ports at any rate, this quantity has been largely exceeded, upwards of 800 tons of goods per lineal yard of quay having passed through the double-storey sheds at that port in one year. At Marseilles, 500 tons has been stated as the limit; but, on the other hand, 1,000 tons is no unusual allowance at Russian ports, and as much as 2,000 tons per lineal yard have been accommodated on certain quays at Antwerpt and Liverpool. The ensuing table gives detailed instances of the ratio of the registered tonnage of vessels to the length and area of the berths occupied. TABLE XXVIII.-COMPARISON OF NUMBER AND NETT REGISTERED TONNAGE OF VESSELS DISCHARGED AND LOADED DURING ONE YEAR AT Where the nature of the traffic is variable, it is evident that no correlation whatever between its amount and the area or length of quay space is possible. A shed may be used at one time for the reception of grain in bulk, at another for cotton in bales, at another for provisions in boxes. The *Min. Proc. Inst. C. E., vol. c., p. 44. + Proceedings, Seventh Inter. Nav. Cong., Brussels, 1898. width of sheds will, accordingly, be regulated almost entirely by the land available for the purpose, and no other limit, apparently, can be suggested. From the smallest dimension consistent with practical utility, sheds have been constructed to such great widths as 150 feet at Liverpool, 190 feet at Manchester, and 196 feet at Havre. In the case of Manchester, however, it should be pointed out that the shed is traversed at its centre by a roadway, included, therefore, within the roof. As indicative of the extremely heterogeneous character of some cargoes the following analyses of representative cases will be interesting and not inappropriate : List of cargo discharged in London, Sept., 1897, from s.s. "Milwaukee," 470 feet by 56 feet by 34 feet 93 inches* : 514 head of cattle. 640 sheep. 18,412 bushels of oats. 1,209 bales of hay. 13,149 sacks of flour. 51,629 pieces of deal. 16,328 boards. 4,398 pieces of lumber. 195 tierces of lard. 200 bags of starch. 189,200 bushels of corn. 20,025 boxes of cheese. 399 cases of apples. 11 cases of machinery. 16,737 deal ends. 5,723 pieces of birch plank. 830 pails of lard. 5,730 bags of grape sugar. This is said to be the largest cargo discharged in London up to that date. In this condition the ship had 11,100 tons dead weight. It is reported she was discharged in 66 working hours. This may be compared with the list of cargo carried by the s.s. "Cevic" on her maiden voyage in 1894 :— 500 head of cattle. 2,330 sheep. 9,061 bales of cotton. 14,778 pails, tierces, barrels, and 3,006 boxes of bacon and ham. 175 boxes of meats. 885 barrels of oil. 5 barrels of bladders. 3 coops of fowls. 100 barrels of glucose. 803 cases of canned meat. 100 tierces of beef. 10 cases of varnish. 27 cases of axes. 33 cases of woodware. ments. 120 barrels of grease and oil. 160 boxes of cheese. 5 barrels of rope covering. 5,000 bags of grape sugar. 4,897 oak staves. * De Russett on "Recent Improvements in Cargo Steamers," Eng. Conf., London, 1899.-Vide Engineering, June 16, 1899. ACCESSIBILITY OF SHEDS. 367 The following are the records of actual dead-weight cargoes discharged at Liverpool at the dates named:— The diversity between weight and capacity is illustrated by the sample cargoes given below: One ton measurement is equivalent to 40 cubic feet of the ship's hold occupied by actual cargo. The ship's gross registered tonnage is based on her total content, calculated by certain rules and divided by 100. The cargoes have been purposely chosen to exhibit a wide range and contrast. Accessibility of Sheds. Under all these mutable conditions one thing, at any rate, is perfectly clear-viz., that the means of access to a shed, and the facilities for the transference and removal of its contents are points of vital importance. It will be well then to briefly consider what steps may be taken to achieve the ideal result. Considerable divergency of opinion will be found to exist in regard to this question at various ports, due mainly to conditions peculiarly local. For there are no less than four ways in which oversea goods may be despatched to their final destinations, and each of these obtains to a greater extent than the others at some locality and demands special measures. They are as follows: 1. By direct transfer to coasting vessels, barges, lighters, and other river and canal craft. 2. By direct transfer to railway trucks and waggons. 3. By direct transfer to lorries and vehicles. In this case the distance the goods are to be taken will not be great. 4. By temporary discharge upon the quay and subsequent transference by canal, rail, or road, as the case may be. These methods may be found both singly and in combination at the same port. With the first, however, we need not concern ourselves as it is outside the scope of the present section. The second and third methods may be considered conjointly as representative of direct transfer in contradistinction to the fourth method which we will term indirect transfer. It is not difficult then to understand that based upon these methods there have arisen two separate and distinct systems of transit sheds, viz. :-(1) Those in which the shed fronts are brought very close to the face of the quay wall, leaving only a narrow margin of from 5 to 10 feet for foot traffic; and (2) those in which the sheds are situated at a distance back from the edge of the quay, sufficiently great to admit of two or more lines of railway running parallel to the quay within the space intervening between the shed and the dock. The latter type of shed is in vogue at Marseilles, Hamburg, Bremen, and most Continental ports, which may be called ports of transit. It is eminently suited to those cases in which a ship's freight is transferable without the necessity of selecting and sorting. The former system is practised at Liverpool, the older docks at London, and in other places where reverse conditions obtain and goods require subdivision before removal. Such ports may be distinguished as ports of destination. Sometimes the two classes of shed are exemplified at the same place, as at Manchester. Of the two lines of rails at the dock side, that nearest the water will generally be used for the loading-off cranes. The second will accommodate the trucks to be loaded, and a third line may advantageously be added as a siding. Quay cranes, however, of broader gauge than the regulation 4 feet 8-inch track, if placed on pedestal platforms, as is frequently the case, admit of a line of trucks passing beneath and between them, thereby producing a considerable saving in quay space. The drawback to the arrangement is a lessening of the stability of the crane. Occasionally, cranes may be found located, so that the outer end of the pedestal runs upon a rail at the quay level, while the inner end is carried on a rail fixed to some part of the shed structure, as in fig. 393. When the shed is close to the quay the discharging cranes must necessarily be situated entirely upon the shed, either at the roof or some intermediate floor level. The two arrangements of quay sheds are illustrated in figs. 349 and 350, which are ground plans respectively of sheds at Bremen and Liverpool. A considerable portion of a ship's cargo may be raised from the hatches by the ship's own appliances, and trucked ashore on gangways, or even, when the vessel's sides are at some height above the quay, discharged by |