Albert Dock

2012-04-05T17:08:00.002-07:00

Albert Dock

General information
Location Liverpool
Coordinates 53°24′1.08″N 2°59′33.72″W
Current tenants The Beatles Story, Merseyside Maritime Museum, Tate Liverpool
Construction started 1841
Completed 1846 (official opening), 1847 (structural completion)
Cost £782,265

Technical details
Floor area 1.29m sq ft (warehouse space), 7.75 acres (dock basin area)
Owner Albert Dock Company Ltd
Architect Jesse Hartley, Phillip Hardwick

The Albert Dock is a complex of dock buildings and warehouses in Liverpool, England. Designed by Jesse Hartley and Philip Hardwick, it was opened in 1846, and was the first structure in Britain to be built from cast iron, brick and stone, with no structural wood. As a result, it was the first non-combustible warehouse system in the world.

At the time of its construction the Albert Dock was considered a revolutionary docking system because ships were loaded and unloaded directly from/to the warehouses. Two years after it opened it was modified to feature the world's first hydraulic cranes. Due to its open yet secure design, the Albert Dock became a popular store for valuable cargoes such as brandy, cotton, tea, silk, tobacco, ivory and sugar. However, despite the Albert Dock's advanced design, the rapid development of shipping technology meant that within 50 years, larger, more open docks were required, although it remained a valuable store for cargo.

During the Second World War, the Albert Dock was requisitioned by the Admiralty serving as a base for boats of the British Atlantic Fleet. The complex was damaged during air raids on Liverpool, notably during the May Blitz of 1941. In the aftermath of the war, the financial problems of the owners and the general decline of docking in the city meant that the future of the Albert Dock was uncertain. Numerous plans were developed for the re-use of the buildings but none came to fruition and in 1972 the dock was finally closed. Having lain derelict for nearly ten years, the redevelopment of the dock began in 1981, when the Merseyside Development Corporation was set up, with the Albert Dock being officially re-opened in 1988.

Today the Albert Dock is a major tourist attraction in the city and the most visited multi-use attraction in the United Kingdom, outside of London. It is a vital component of Liverpool's UNESCO designated World Heritage Maritime Mercantile City and the docking complex and warehouses also comprise the largest single collection of Grade I listed buildings anywhere in the UK.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Dock

2012-03-13T21:26:00.001-07:00

Merseyside
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Merseyside (play /ˈmɜrzisaɪd/) is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 1,365,900.[1] It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary, and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral, and the city of Liverpool. Merseyside, which was created on 1 April 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act 1972, takes its name from the River Mersey.

Merseyside spans 249 square miles (645 km2) of land which border Lancashire (to the north-east), Greater Manchester (to the east), and Cheshire (to the south and south-west); the Irish Sea is to the west. North Wales is across the Dee Estuary. There is a mix of high density urban areas, suburbs, semi-rural and rural locations in Merseyside, but overwhelmingly the land use is urban. It has a focused central business district, formed by Liverpool City Centre, but Merseyside is also a polycentric county with five metropolitan districts, each of which has at least one major town centre and outlying suburbs. The Liverpool Urban Area is the seventh most populous conurbation in the UK, and dominates the geographic centre of the county, while the smaller Birkenhead Urban Area dominates the Wirral Peninsula in the south.

For the 12 years following 1974 the county had a two-tier system of local government; district councils shared power with the Merseyside County Council. The county council was abolished in 1986, and so its districts (the metropolitan boroughs) are now effectively unitary authority areas. However, the metropolitan county continues to exist in law and as a geographic frame of reference,[2] and several county-wide services are co-ordinated by authorities and joint-boards, such as Merseytravel (for public transport) and the Merseyside Police (for law-enforcement); as a ceremonial county, Merseyside has a Lord Lieutenant and a High Sheriff. Merseyside is joined by the neighbouring borough of Halton to form the Liverpool City Region, which utilises The Mersey Partnership as a development agency.

Merseyside is an amalgamation of 22 former local government districts from the former administrative counties of Lancashire, Cheshire and six autonomous county boroughs centred on Birkenhead, Bootle, Liverpool, Southport, St Helens, and Wallasey.

from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merseyside

True Reds Never Fade

Albert Dock