Volume Eight - Pre-Victorian to the present day - more aspects - To dredge the River Ely - 1860's

As previously stated back in Volume One, the Ely Tidal Harbour Bill and the Penarth Harbour, Dock and Railway Acts of 1856, 1857 and subsequent years, authorised the TVR to lease, for 999 years, a new dock, basin, tidal harbour and railway. The tidal harbour, built at a cost of £137,000, opened on 4th July 1859 and was equipped with ten coal staithes and three steam ballast cranes.   A contract was placed with Thomas G. Hardie for excavation and dredging the bed of the River Ely, opposite Cwtch-y-Cwm, during the years 1859-1862.   As part of the Parliamentary process the Admiralty had to present reports to the house under the Preliminary Inquiries Act of 1851. The first Report of the Admiralty in 1856 had the following to report:-

Ely Tidal Harbour and Railway Bill - 1856

The principal objects contemplated by the above Bill, as far as the Admiralty jurisdiction is concerned, are:-

1. The construction of a line of railway from the Taff Vale Railway at Clan-yr-Afon to the north-east bank of the River Ely, a distance of about six miles.

2. The embanking, widening, deepening, and improving of that part of the River Ely, between a point about 1,102 yards below Cogan Pill, and a point 3,168 yards above said Pill.

3. The construction of an embankment on or adjacent to Penarth Flats, commencing at about 1,012 yards below Cogan Pill, and extending northwards for about 1,012 yards.