Industrial Heritage at Greenock

Greenock is on the southern shore of the Firth of Clyde, and when walking along the waterfront it's immediately clear that once this was an important port, with plenty of heavy industrial machinery still around. These days some of the old warehouses have been converted into modern apartments, and parts of the old dockland area has been reclaimed and developed into a business park, but there's still plenty of the older industry to see too.


The dockland area to the east, near to where I was staying with work, is known as James Watt dock, and is more recent than I thought, dating from the 1880s. Watt is Greenock's most famous son, known for 'inventing' the steam engine, though actually what he did was improve Newcomen's earlier atmospheric engine, by adding a condenser, making steam power much more efficient.

Anyway, I digress. James Watt dock is still in use today, and the huge hammerhead crane still dominates the landscape. Once this area was used to offload sugar cargoes from the colonies, but today it's used as a berth for the Caledonian Macbrayne ferry.

Further to the west sits the Clydeport Ocean Terminal, the modern port area in Greenock. After a bite to eat, I walked along the pleasant esplanade with views towards the distant cranes, and looked out for the sun setting behind the hills of Argyll in the distance.