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Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth

Article about: I thought for those interested, I would tell the tale of the fate of Pounds Shipbreakers in Portsmouth UK. There in the quiet tidal backwaters of Portsmouth harbour, out of the way, minding

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    Default Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth

    I thought for those interested, I would tell the tale of the fate of Pounds Shipbreakers in Portsmouth UK.

    There in the quiet tidal backwaters of Portsmouth harbour, out of the way, minding its own business scrapping ships and all manner of military vehicles since WW1, was the vast yard of Henry Pounds. Showcased in After The Battle issues ( #25 & #37 ) the “peace” of the yard was rudely interrupted in the mid 1970’s with the construction of the M275 motorway RIGHT THROUGH the sprawling area!!

    Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth

    These photos are pre- motorway in the early 1970’s…. Looking south & north.

    Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth

    ( Well, you CAN see the motorway earthworks in the background )

    This is after the motorway ( and what it looks like today ) which spelled the end of Pounds as a ship breakers!

    Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth


    It happened this way – tell me if you think this is familiar?

    Complaints started to come into the Portsmouth Authorities about what an eyesore the scrapyard was coming into Portsmouth over the lovely gateway bridge – couldn’t something be done about it?

    Well, nothing could be done as Pounds had a long term lease to break up ships in what was previously a quiet out-of-the-way area ( they were there FIRST ) so the council’s solution? … stop them bringing in ships to break up – because of the possible threat to the bridge from derelict ships being towed underneath. The vessels would need to be broken down to the waterline on the west side of the bridge BEFORE they were brought to the eastern holding area – this was hugely problematic as the storage area / scrapyard had the space and the breaking area ( with the cranes ) didn't. This impost was costly for Pounds and so shipbreaking activities started to wind down as there was no place to store them anymore.

    Thankfully in the 1970’s a resurgence of interest in the military hardware ‘stacked 3 high’ around the sprawling yard meant many of the tanks and soft skin vehicles were purchased whole for museums and other collections in the UK and abroad and by the early 1990’s the area was mostly cleared out and was sighted to be sold for redevelopment.

    By the 2000s the Tipner / Stamshaw area was expanding and the foreshore was ripe for a fancy modern housing development. Plans were drawn up and by 2012 approval was granted for 518 homes to be built ...... but, then nothing has actually happened as the site needed so much decontamination and soil replacement that it is still a dumping ground for clean fill - as seen in the google image above!

    Here is what Pounds scrapyard was going to be turned into…

    Pounds Shipowners & Shipbreakers, Portsmouth

    Then as the developers got greedier, wanting the rest of Pounds peninsula, the conservationists got involved. A "super peninsula" was proposed by Portsmouth City Council that would have seen up to 4,000 homes built - but more than 12,000 people have signed a petition to save what the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust called an "internationally important wildlife site".


    So there you have it – the ghosts of ww2 have had the last laugh and as of today, everything has stalled.
    Last edited by Danmark; 03-10-2021 at 01:49 AM.
    " I'm putting off procrastination until next week "

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