The natural advantages of a port, however, are of the greatest value when they combine many things far distant from the port itself with the natural advantages of the harbour, its surroundings, and its outlet.
To cite New York once more, among its great advantages are these: First, a fine harbour, with ease of access to the sea yet with thorough protection from its storms. Second, suitable land surrounding the harbour, on which factories, warehouses, piers, and shipyards can be erected. Third, a great and navigable river leading into a rich country. Fourth, a fine canal connecting the upper reaches of that river with a far greater land, rich in people of great purchasing and producing power, rich in mines, in farms, in factories. Fifth, routes leading overland into the interior along which great railroads have been built that reach with their network ten thousand centres that otherwise could not buy the goods imported to New York or sell their own either there or beyond the seas. These five things have created at the mouth of the Hudson one of the greatest seaports of all time. Without any one of them New York could not be the port it is, but of the five, the first two are the least important, for a harbour could be made, and had the surrounding land been a marsh it could have been built into dry land. Without the trade of the great land to the West, however, New York could not have been the port that it is to-day.
But an account of all the factors that go to make a port would take one far afield, so with only this inconsequential statement in reference to the vast economic structure that lies behind a port, I shall confine myself directly to the port itself and to its environs, its equipment, and its activities.
No two ports are identical, but the major ports of the world divide themselves more or less readily into types which I may be permitted to call the European and the American types, inaccurate as those classifications may be. I shall describe, in more or less detail, these two types, and add to this something from other ports that fall less readily under these two inaccurate classifications.
To begin with it needs to be said that mere size has little bearing on a port’s ability to handle large quantities of freight. By comparison with the area of the port of New York the area of the port of Liverpool is limited, New York being perhaps six times larger. Across the Mersey from Liverpool are the Birkenhead Docks, which, so far as mere area is concerned, are hardly larger than the Cumminipaw Terminal of the Central Railroad of New Jersey which lies across the Hudson from the Battery. The port of New York, including the New Jersey side of the Hudson and the Bay, has a developed waterfront several times as great as the port of Liverpool including the Birkenhead Docks, yet the tonnage of overseas freight handled in each of these two ports is roughly the same.
The same comparison can be made with many other European ports, which are all far smaller than New York although several equal or exceed New York in the tonnage of transoceanic freight handled.
But let us take New York and describe it, in order that other ports may be compared with it.
A MAP OF THE PORT OF CAPE TOWN
Table Bay is open to the force of north and northwest winds. Before the bay could protect ships from the frequent storms blowing from these directions a series of breakwaters had to be built, in the lee of which ships could anchor.