St Helier Harbour
St Helier Harbour is the main Harbour in Jersey. This harbour is used to dock Jersey citizens boats, as well as how Jersey citizens travel to and from the Island on the Condon Ferry. There are 3 marinas in St Helier Harbour, which are used for private yachts on pontoons and drying harbours for commercial shipping, with facilities including a dock for lift-on/lift-off cargo ships, roll-on/roll-off ferry berths and a tanker berth. This harbour is operated by Ports of Jersey, the operative government company.
A Berth- A designated area where a vessel may be moored, typically for unloading and loading, assigned by an authority – in this example, Ports of Jersey.
The harbour gains its name from the 6th-century ascetic hermit from Belgium, Helier (Helierius).
The Old Harbour
This area is known as the Old Harbour, because it was the English and French Harbour with berths for over 500 motorboats and sailing yachts used for leisurely purposes. This resulted in the boats being able to dry out on the mud below, when it was low tide. Down here is where South pier and, the abandoned pub, La Folie Inn, are and have become an area in which marine engineers are working for South Pier Marina and St Helier Yacht club. Back in 1790, this was only a small jetty at the side of the island where ships coming into the island could go.
Construction
In the 19th Century the Old Harbour was constructed. The Chamber of Commerce urged the States Assembly to build a new harbour, but they refused, so the Chamber took it into their own hands and paid to upgrade the harbour in 1790. To shelter the jetty and harbour a new breakwater was constructed and in 1814 the merchants constructed the roads now known as Commercial Buildings and Le Quai des Marchands. They did this to connect the harbours to the town and in 1832 construction was finished on the Esplanade and its sea wall. In 1837, a rapid expansion in shipping led the States of Jersey to order the construction of two new piers: the Victoria and Albert Piers.
The Main Harbour
The main harbour provides deep water berths for commercial vessels alongside the Victoria Quay and New North Quay.
Today, Ports of Jersey operates all entry and exit points to the island, including harbours and airport. They have plans to re-develop St Helier Harbour into a modern commercial maritime hub.
Currently this harbour is used for citizens to dock their boats and for cargo ships to leave and return with goods from other places around the world.
Elizabeth Harbour
The Elizabeth Harbour consists of a ferry terminal, two roll-on/roll-off ferry berths and a trailer park for shipping containers. This Harbour is also used to travel to Poole, Guernsey, and St Malo, traditional ferries to Saint-Malo, Guernsey and Portsmouth and foot passenger ferries to Granville, Barneville-Carteret and Sark.
Involved within this are three marinas known as:
- The La Collette Yacht Basin,
- The Saint Helier Marina (built in 1980),
- The Elizabeth Marina,
Out of all of these, The La Collette Yacht Basin is the only one which provides non-tidal, 24-hour access to the sea, leading it to be home to Jersey’s commercial fishing community.
Development of the Harbour
