Volume Twelve - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - further aspects - A History of Penarth Dock by Roy Thorne . . .

1836 - A Plan of Brunel's Proposed Dock

See also Volume Nine, Chapter Fifteen - Mr. B's 1836 Ely Docks for more info including detailed plans, etc.

Clive agreed not to exact the terms of this agreement in late 1843 to allow the T.V.R. to make an agreement to lease wharfs on the East Bank of the Bute Ship Canal in 1844.

Lord Bute objected to the completion of this Ely Branch until the main line as opened from Cardiff to Merthyr, but he did not object to the Ely proposals. The proposal for new works at the Ely were abandoned because of the cost. Money was the deciding factor. The T.V.R. like the West Bute Dock, during its earlier years was not a profitable undertaking and its shares at the time sold at a discount.

The main line was costing more than had been estimated, and in 1840 the T.V.R. sought powers from Parliament to increase its capital by £220,000, to remove the restrictions on profits to 7%, to charge 6d per ton on the Cogan Branch traffic, and sundry other matters. Much of this capital was required for the Cogan 8ranch, and upon this issue the Bill was opposed by Bute. In a few years, as the Taff and subsidiary valleys actively developed, traffic increased enormously and the T.V.R. came to be one of the most prosperous railway concerns in the United Kingdom.

The coal and coke traffic increased from 152,100 tons in 1643 to 874,362 tons in 1853, and to 2,772,011 tons in 1863.

By 1844 plans for both the Ely Branch and shipping facilities at Cogan Pill, and the cut were abandoned, and the two parties reached agreement.  It was in both their interests to agree because of the expanding coal trade. Before the agreement of 1844 had been reached the T.V.R. had made use of a small dock. This “Little Dock”, as it was known, was on the eastern bank of the Glamorgan Canal in the North West portion of the T.V.R. yard and south of Patrick Street, known until about 1855 as Little Dock Street.