The Floating Harbour, Bristol

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In the heart of Bristol, England is the infamous "Bristol Harbour". This is a historic city center area that covers approximately 70 acres and has existed since the 13th century. Its 19th century style was affected by the installation of lock gates on the tidal stretch from River Avon to City Centre and providing a tidal by-pass for the river. It is now a "Floating Harbour" as the water level remains constant and not affected the river's tidal fluctuations. Netham Lock is the eastern upstream limit of the harbour beyond which is a junction - one arm the navigable RIver Avon that continues upstream to Bath, and on the other a tidal River Avon. The First mile of floating harbour downstream from Netham Lock is an artificial channel known as the feeder canal while the tidal River Avon follows its original route. Between Bristol Temple Meads railway station and Hotwells, the harbour and the River Avon run parallel at a distance of approximately .65 miles apart. At the railway station the Floating Harbour occupies the original bed of the River Avon and meanders through Bristol's city centre, Canon's Marsh, and Hotwells. To the south the River Avon flows through the artificial channel known as "New Cut". The separation of the floating harbour and the tidal River carries currents and silting into the harbour that prevents flooding. In Hotwells, the floating harbour rejoins the river through a series of locks and flows into the Avon Gorge. This Harbour is also the original Port of Bristol but has turned to much smaller ships as modern ships and cargo are too big for this small harbour being re-routed to the docks at Avonmouth and Portbury 3 miles downstream at the mouth of the River Avon. The harbour is now a shopping and tourist attraction with museums, galleries, exhibitions, bars, and nightclubs. It has become a city cultural center with highlights such as the Arnolfini art gallery, Watershed media and arts centre, Bristol Industrial Museum, Museum of Bristol, At-Bristol science exhibition center, and fashionable apartment buildings. Museum boats are permanently berthed in the harbour including Isambard Kingdom Brunel's SS Great Britain, the first iron-hulled and propeller driven ocean liner. A replica of the Matthew in which John Cabot sailed to North America in 1497 also sits in the harbour. The historic vessels of the Industrial Museum, which include the steam tug Mayflower, firefloat Pyronaut and motor tug John King, are periodically operated. The Bristol Ferry Boat operates at the harbour, serving landing stages close to most of the harbour-side attractions and also providing a commuter service to and from the city centre and Bristol Temple Meads railway station. Bristol was a village that grew up along the banks of the Rivers Avon and Frome. Somewhere around 1240, an artificial deep channel called the "Saint Augustine's Reach" was built to flow into the River Avon and became the heart of Bristol's docks with quays and wharfs. Beginning in the 13th century, the rivers became modified for use as docks including the diversion of the River Frome. Since the River Avon inside the gorge mixed with the River Severn can have tides fluctuating 30 feet in between high and low water made the river easily navigable during high-tide but difficult to get through during low tide, stranding ships - first utilized to unload when the tides went down and deliberately stranding ships. This gave term to the phrase "shipshape and Bristol fashion" to describe boats that could handle repeatedly being stranded. 1420 there were vessels from Bristol regularly heading out to Iceland with rumors that sails from Bristol had already made landfall in the Americas before Christopher Columbus or John Cabot. When Cabot came to Bristol, he propositioned the king that he could reach Asia by sailing west across the north Atlantic and that it would be shorter and quicker than Columbus' southern route. He got agreement and funding. 1670 the City had 6,000 tons of shipping of which half was used for importing tobacco and later heavily for the slave trade. Since the 1980's millions of pounds have been invested in re-working the harbourside. By 1999 the Pero's footbridge was finished and linked the At-Bristol exhibition with the tourist attractions. 2000 saw the opening of the At-Bristol center over the semi-direlict land at Canon's Marsh and some of the Grade 2 listed buildings became refurbished and re-utilized. Over 44.3 million pounds from the National Lottery and another 43.4 million from the Bristol city council and partners invested in revitalizing the area. Construction of theaters, retail buildings, new flats, homes, and watershed offices. Today there are many festivals held in this area - such as the Bristol harbour Festival every July where tall ships and all other boats come attracting over 200,000 visitors with live music, street performances, and entertainment. Since 1996 it has been the tromping grounds of various festivals including the first International Festival of the Sea. Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

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Pero was a slave who lived in the 18th century and served to the merchant John Pinney at 5 Great George Street. I don't know exactly why he deserved a bridge to be named after him, probably because his name was written somewhere unlike the names of other slaves who passed through Port of Bristol at the times when Bristol was the leading centre for slave trade.

The Pero's bridge stands in central Bristol and connects the Millennium square with the Queen square. It is a pedestrian bridge constructed in 1999 by Ove Arup & Partners engineers. The bridge has three spans; the two outer ones are fixed and the central section can be raised. The most distinctive features of the bridge are the pair of horn-shaped sculptures which act as counterweights for the lifting section. Lit at night, they make a new landmark on Bristol's cityscape.

One of the former Victorian warehouses located in the center of Bristol was converted to Watershed media centre. The old warehouse building now houses three cinemas, a café/bar, events/conferencing spaces, and office spaces. Watershed Media Centre hosts several annual film festivals, including ResFest, Depict!, Brief Encounters, the Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, Slapstick Film Festival, and WildScreen.

On the ground floor there are several cafes and bars - nice to sit down and watch the Harbour that Floats.

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A Floating Harbour may sound like a strange expression, but it takes just a short walk to the muddy banks of the Avon river to realize the need of it. The river Avon has extreme tidal changes and in order to enable the harbour activities there was a need for a harbour to "float" unaffected by the low and high tidal changes.

First works started as early as 13th Century, but it was in the 19th century when Bristol's Floating Harbour finally took shape thanks to a complicated system of locks at the ends of the channels forming the harbour. Today, as ships have increased in size the Floating Harbour has lost its original use and is now a large redevelopment site in the middle of Bristol. Most of the new developments are concentrated in the central area of Harbourside where the new entertainment, cultural, retail and housing facilities are being constructed on site of the former docks and warehouses.

Some historic buildings and warehouses are converted to new uses, and there are still areas (especially on the southern side) that still have the harbour/industrial feel with a mix of unused warehouses, cranes and railway tracks - something that I always find interesting for walking around in search of photo opportunities.

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The EDF Energy Bristol Harbour Festival is an interesting event with a mixture of boats and music. For a weekend in late July, different ships can be seen in the harbour, including many sailships. Some of them can be visited, but some are just companies promoting the trips they offer with their ships. Anyway, all of them are nice to see in the one or other way. Beside that, you will have the usual food/drink and promotion stands you will find at any similar event. In the late afternoon, entertainment starts in form of music, including a larger reggae concert.

The Bristol Harbour festival takes place every year. Unfortunately, the webpages I found are just giving information about the event in 2006.

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St. Augustine's Reach is a central part of the floating harbour. Once a lively harbour, it was integrated into the concept of modern Bristol. Smaller boats dominate the area, together with beautifully restored warehouses where you will find cafés and restaurants. Close to St. Augustine's Reach, you will find many places where Bristol's cultural life takes place, including a futuristic looking place called @Bristol.

The "Horned Footbridge", built in 1999, connects both sides of St. Augustine's reach.

St. Augustine's Parade is a street which saw major changes during the last decades. First a part of the harbour, it became a ring road after WWII. In the second half of the 20th century, the southern part of the ring was closed and later the middle was redesigned. Fountains were installed simulating a river which flows southwards into the harbour. The street became less car-oriented and so a new kind of pedestrian zone was created. Especially in summer, St. Augustine's parade is a popular area with its fountains and several places to sit down and enjoy the day. It it not as youth-oriented as College Green and not as shopping-oriented as Broadmead, but must look sad in winter when the fountains are not in function.

Let's face it - this is what a lot of Bristol is all about: maritime history and industry. The Floating harbour houses the Industrial Museum which you can see in the picture and which is full of vehicles and maritime models. If you still want more, there is the Maritime Heritage Centre further out, with gives the background to Bristol's maritime history and the ships you find moored out here, such as Matthew and s/s Great Britain. The first being a replica of the boat that John Cabot sailed to America in and the second is the first propeller-driven, ocean-going iron ship in the world.