Port of Mainz
Encyclopedia
The Port of Mainz is the port of Mainz
, Germany
. Lying on the western bank of the Rhine river, it has a long history reaching back through the Middle Ages
to Roman times
. The modern port facilities, existing for approximately 120 years in their general environs, are located mostly to the north of the city proper, and will be extended to the north of their current location during the coming years to make space for a new residential area.
times was a major colonial town, the centre of Roman life in the area for many centuries. The facilities included a trade port at the 'Dimesser Ort' (in the area of the current port), and a military port (in the area of the current old town), from which the vessels of the Roman river navy
patrolled the Rhine.
During the gradual Roman retreat from their remaining possessions in front of invading German tribes
, some of the naval vessels were abandoned in a section of the port (likely around 407 AD, when the city was sacked for the second time
). Their remains rested in the earth and mud of the riverbank before being recovered 1981/1982 during excavation works for a Hilton hotel. They are now exhibited together with two life-sized replica ships in a dedicated local museum.
, received staple right
s. This meant that any river trading ship had to unload its goods and offer them for sale to the local citizenry for three days. Only after this period was it allowed to travel on with its remaining goods. This legal control over the merchant shipping on the Rhine helped make the city rich.
The increasing importance of the wine trade in Mainz helped keep the port prosperous after the end of the Middle Ages. During 1860-1885, the Rhine was also being channelised and dredged to become a major route for the increasing trade of an industrialising Europe. This resulted in two new port areas being built for the city, the Winterhafen ('Winter port') south of the old town (just north of the Südbrücke), while a new Zollhafen ('Customs Port') was constructed north of the city, in the general area of the old Roman trade port. The Zollhafen was surrounded by fortresses, but its commercial function was clearly expressed in the many stately warehouses that were soon erected around the 12 ha
water and on the 15 ha land area. At the time, it was considered one of the most modern river ports of the world.
Beyond World War II
During the Second World War, the Zollhafen (by now clearly the main industrial port), was about 85% destroyed. Of the old buildings, few survived, amongst them the massive wine storage building, a concrete structure erected in 1912. However, the port quickly recovered, and as early as 1950 reached its pre-war average annual turnover, with 740,497 tonnes. The 1 million tonnes mark was reached in 1952. In the following decades, most changes were operational or technical only, such as the installation of modern cranes in the 1980s. In the 1990s, plans were then begun for a possible extension or relocation of facilities that were increasingly by their location close to the growing residential areas of the city.
'. It currently operates on about 30 ha
, and turned over 1.4 million tonnes in 2006, serving 1,381 ships and handling 112,964 containers. Next to containers, food and feedstock, petrochemicals and building supplies were the most important goods.
Relocation
The ancient port stretched from the 'Am Zollhafen' street northwards to the Nordbrücke
. Since the area had become constrained for modern-day port operations, a section of riverfront to the north of the bridge had been selected for a new container terminal. Part of the existing areas of the harbor will be transformed into a residential quarter. The new container terminal is intended to raise the container volumes sufficiently to push the port back into the Top 5 of German river container ports.
The new site provides 522 m of quayside, 80000 m2 operational surface for 10,300 TEU
, 4 shipside crane bridges and 1 landside crane bridge, and will see up to 700 truck movements per day, or 454.400 TEU movements per year. 36 connections for refrigerated containers are installed, with a possibility to double the capacity. It is connected to the railway network via Mainz Hauptbahnhof
with a double track. The amount of the subsidy by the land Rhineland-Palatinate
increased to € 9 million for the railway connection. The port is connected to the motorway system in Germany
by Bundesautobahn 643
. The terminal is operated by a private company Frankenbach (75%) in cooperation with the local publicly owned Stadtwerke Mainz AG (25%) as the site owner. The € 30 million overall cost had been shared between the partners and the land Rhineland-Palatinate.
Time to the Port of Rotterdam
is 24 hours descending and 60 hours ascending again from Rotterdam.
Excursion ships
Increasingly, especially in the 20th century, Mainz also began to be used as a starting point or stopover location for Rhine tourist cruises. These excursion mainly visit the stretch of the river known as the 'Romantic Rhine
' of castles and cliffs, being mainly the length between Mainz and Koblenz
, the Rhine Gorge
. The excursion ships do not have port facilities as such in Mainz, but rather tie up at modest floating jetty
terminals in the area of the old town, south of the Zollhafen.
Mainz
Mainz under the Holy Roman Empire, and previously was a Roman fort city which commanded the west bank of the Rhine and formed part of the northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. Lying on the western bank of the Rhine river, it has a long history reaching back through the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
to Roman times
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
. The modern port facilities, existing for approximately 120 years in their general environs, are located mostly to the north of the city proper, and will be extended to the north of their current location during the coming years to make space for a new residential area.
Roman times
Mainz ('Mogontiacum' in Latin times) during RomanAncient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
times was a major colonial town, the centre of Roman life in the area for many centuries. The facilities included a trade port at the 'Dimesser Ort' (in the area of the current port), and a military port (in the area of the current old town), from which the vessels of the Roman river navy
Roman Navy
The Roman Navy comprised the naval forces of the Ancient Roman state. Although the navy was instrumental in the Roman conquest of the Mediterranean basin, it never enjoyed the prestige of the Roman legions...
patrolled the Rhine.
During the gradual Roman retreat from their remaining possessions in front of invading German tribes
Migration Period
The Migration Period, also called the Barbarian Invasions , was a period of intensified human migration in Europe that occurred from c. 400 to 800 CE. This period marked the transition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages...
, some of the naval vessels were abandoned in a section of the port (likely around 407 AD, when the city was sacked for the second time
Crossing of the Rhine
31 December 406, is the often-repeated date of the crossing of the Rhine by a mixed group of barbarians that included Vandals, Alans and Suebi...
). Their remains rested in the earth and mud of the riverbank before being recovered 1981/1982 during excavation works for a Hilton hotel. They are now exhibited together with two life-sized replica ships in a dedicated local museum.
Middle Ages
For the early Middle Ages, there is limited information about any port facilities, possibly reflecting the much-reduced stature of the city. However, in 1317 Mainz, in addition to becoming a market townMarket town
Market town or market right is a legal term, originating in the medieval period, for a European settlement that has the right to host markets, distinguishing it from a village and city...
, received staple right
Staple right
The staple right was a medieval right accorded to certain ports, the staple ports, that required merchant barges or ships to unload their goods at the port, and display them for sale for a certain period, often three days...
s. This meant that any river trading ship had to unload its goods and offer them for sale to the local citizenry for three days. Only after this period was it allowed to travel on with its remaining goods. This legal control over the merchant shipping on the Rhine helped make the city rich.
Modern age
Industrial AgeThe increasing importance of the wine trade in Mainz helped keep the port prosperous after the end of the Middle Ages. During 1860-1885, the Rhine was also being channelised and dredged to become a major route for the increasing trade of an industrialising Europe. This resulted in two new port areas being built for the city, the Winterhafen ('Winter port') south of the old town (just north of the Südbrücke), while a new Zollhafen ('Customs Port') was constructed north of the city, in the general area of the old Roman trade port. The Zollhafen was surrounded by fortresses, but its commercial function was clearly expressed in the many stately warehouses that were soon erected around the 12 ha
Hectare
The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...
water and on the 15 ha land area. At the time, it was considered one of the most modern river ports of the world.
Beyond World War II
During the Second World War, the Zollhafen (by now clearly the main industrial port), was about 85% destroyed. Of the old buildings, few survived, amongst them the massive wine storage building, a concrete structure erected in 1912. However, the port quickly recovered, and as early as 1950 reached its pre-war average annual turnover, with 740,497 tonnes. The 1 million tonnes mark was reached in 1952. In the following decades, most changes were operational or technical only, such as the installation of modern cranes in the 1980s. In the 1990s, plans were then begun for a possible extension or relocation of facilities that were increasingly by their location close to the growing residential areas of the city.
Operations
The port is owned (since 1949) and operated by the local publicly owned utility company Mainzer Stadtwerke AG, via the holding company 'Mainzer Hafen GmbHGesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung
Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung is a type of legal entityvery common in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and other Central European countries...
'. It currently operates on about 30 ha
Hectare
The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...
, and turned over 1.4 million tonnes in 2006, serving 1,381 ships and handling 112,964 containers. Next to containers, food and feedstock, petrochemicals and building supplies were the most important goods.
Relocation
The ancient port stretched from the 'Am Zollhafen' street northwards to the Nordbrücke
Kaiserbrücke (Mainz)
The Kaiser Bridge is a railway bridge on the Mainz rail bypass across the Rhine at the north end of Mainz in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Built between 1901 and 1904, it was named for the German Emperor Wilhelm II...
. Since the area had become constrained for modern-day port operations, a section of riverfront to the north of the bridge had been selected for a new container terminal. Part of the existing areas of the harbor will be transformed into a residential quarter. The new container terminal is intended to raise the container volumes sufficiently to push the port back into the Top 5 of German river container ports.
The new site provides 522 m of quayside, 80000 m2 operational surface for 10,300 TEU
Twenty-foot equivalent unit
The twenty-foot equivalent unit is an inexact unit of cargo capacity often used to describe the capacity of container ships and container terminals...
, 4 shipside crane bridges and 1 landside crane bridge, and will see up to 700 truck movements per day, or 454.400 TEU movements per year. 36 connections for refrigerated containers are installed, with a possibility to double the capacity. It is connected to the railway network via Mainz Hauptbahnhof
Mainz Hauptbahnhof
is the Hauptbahnhof for the city of Mainz in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It is used by about 80,000 travellers and visitors each day and is therefore one of the busiest 21 stations in Germany...
with a double track. The amount of the subsidy by the land Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
increased to € 9 million for the railway connection. The port is connected to the motorway system in Germany
German Autobahnen
The German autobahns are the nationally coordinated motorway system in Germany. In German, they are officially called Bundesautobahn , which translates as federal expressways...
by Bundesautobahn 643
Bundesautobahn 643
is a short autobahn in Germany. The long motorway crosses the Rhine River, connecting the cities of Wiesbaden and Mainz, the capital cities of the federal states of Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate, respectively...
. The terminal is operated by a private company Frankenbach (75%) in cooperation with the local publicly owned Stadtwerke Mainz AG (25%) as the site owner. The € 30 million overall cost had been shared between the partners and the land Rhineland-Palatinate.
Time to the Port of Rotterdam
Port of Rotterdam
The Port of Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe, located in the city of Rotterdam, Netherlands. From 1962 until 2004 it was the world's busiest port, now overtaken by first Shanghai and then Singapore...
is 24 hours descending and 60 hours ascending again from Rotterdam.
Excursion ships
Increasingly, especially in the 20th century, Mainz also began to be used as a starting point or stopover location for Rhine tourist cruises. These excursion mainly visit the stretch of the river known as the 'Romantic Rhine
Middle Rhine
Between Bingen and Bonn, Germany, the Rhine River flows as the Middle Rhine through the Rhine Gorge, a formation created by erosion, which happened at about the same rate as an uplift in the region, leaving the river at about its original level, and the surrounding lands raised...
' of castles and cliffs, being mainly the length between Mainz and Koblenz
Koblenz
Koblenz is a German city situated on both banks of the Rhine at its confluence with the Moselle, where the Deutsches Eck and its monument are situated.As Koblenz was one of the military posts established by Drusus about 8 BC, the...
, the Rhine Gorge
Rhine Gorge
The Rhine Gorge is a popular name for the Upper Middle Rhine Valley, a 65 km section of the River Rhine between Koblenz and Bingen in Germany...
. The excursion ships do not have port facilities as such in Mainz, but rather tie up at modest floating jetty
Jetty
A jetty is any of a variety of structures used in river, dock, and maritime works that are generally carried out in pairs from river banks, or in continuation of river channels at their outlets into deep water; or out into docks, and outside their entrances; or for forming basins along the...
terminals in the area of the old town, south of the Zollhafen.
External links
- Mainzer Hafen (website of the official port management company, in German)