This post, along with the others under the sign of "Dock Roads", is a shared research resource, principally for Philip and Hangfeng who are working on an idea that explores the situation of the Bund in Shanghai and the situation of the Pier Head in Liverpool.
The "dockers' umbrella" was the the worlds first overhead electric railway. Running from Dingle, south of the city centre, along the Dock Road to the northern docks, the elevated track provided dockers with shelter from the rain, as they waited for work. Dockers were employed to unload and load cargo from vessels moored in the docks as and when they arrived. It was hard and dangerous work, but dependent on the traffic into the port, and so employers preferred a "casualized" system, paying dockers wages for particular unloading and loading work, not a weekly wage!
These videos from You Tube show views of the docks from the railway.
Posted by Philip Courtenay
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