Cosmopolitan Dock – unusual double dock feature
Stephen Davies: The interesting thing about Cosmopolitan Dock – unique in HK and quite uncommon elsewhere – is that it was designed from the outset as two docks in one; an inner and an outer. The dock had a fat, slightly shorter outer part (212 x 100 feet) and a slightly narrower, slightly longer inner part (234 x 83 feet – measurements overall length and width at top).
That meant that it could accommodate two ships, though the plan rather required that the yard managers knew how long any repairs would take, so that they always had the long term job in the inner dock and the shorter term jobs in the outer dock. Alternatively, the whole could be used as a single dock, though the beam of the larger vessel was always constrained by the beam limits of the inner dock.
Courtesy: ports.co.za
I don’t know when that was taken out of commission, but it wasn’t until 1950 that the same pattern was followed again for the present day Hughes Dock there.
This article was first posted on 16th March 2015.
Related Inddhk articles:
- Cosmopolitan Docks during the Occupation, 1942-1945
- BAAG Report KWIZ #72 Naval Reports – information about Cosmopolitan, Kowloon, Taikoo and Naval dockyards and Kowloon wharves
- BAAG Report KWIZ #70 Naval Reports – information about Kowloon, Taikoo, Naval and Cosmopolitan dockyards
- BAAG Report KWIZ #66 Naval Reports – information about Taikoo, Aberdeen, Kowloon & Cosmopolitan dockyards