Autonomous Board for the Funchal Harbour Works 1Creation, remit and membership
Autonomous Board for the Funchal Harbour Works
Original title: Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal
Account of the Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal, the autonomous board created in 1913 to improve Funchal harbour, covering its remit, membership, revenues, projects, the failed Fumasil contract and works carried out around 1930–33.
1Creation, remit and membership
This body was created by the decree of 13 August 1913. The purpose of its creation and the scope of its remit are set out in Article 1 of its founding law, as follows:
- ‘The indispensable repair works on the harbour of refuge at Pontinha (‘little point’), on both the inner and the outer side of the cove
- the installation on the same mole (breakwater) of loading and unloading machinery
- a link with the customs house by means of an electric railway line
- warehouses at the terminus of the line, together with the extension and improvement of the quay at the entrance to the city
- the construction of a goods quay opposite the customs house
- the opening of a seafront avenue between the quay at the entrance to the city and the eastern end of Campo Almirante Reis (‘Admiral Reis square’)
- the construction of a small dock between the customs quay and the mouth of the Ribeira de Santa Luzia (‘St Lucy’s stream’), with the necessary installations for the island’s small-scale coastal shipping
- and, finally, all other complementary installations, such as a customs building, the construction of a maritime disinfection station, of a market, a fish market, a building for the Harbour Master’s Office (Capitania do Porto) and the health service, and likewise the maintenance, operation and use of all the installations, works and services that it may set up within the limits of its remit’.
The Autonomous Harbour Board was made up of the following: the president of the District General Council (Junta Geral), the president of the Funchal Council, the president of the Agricultural Board (Junta Agrícola), the director of Public Works of the District, the director of the Customs House, the harbour master, the president of the Commercial Association (Associação Comercial), a member specially appointed by the Minister of Development (Ministro do Fomento), a member elected by the banking houses, a member elected by the trade associations of wholesale and retail merchants, and a member elected by the Councils of the various municipalities (concelhos) of the district. The deputies and senators elected for the constituency of Funchal were also members of this body.
The revenues of the Autonomous Board are expressly laid down in Article 11 of its founding law, and were as follows:
- a) a surcharge of 3 per cent on import duties and on the municipal taxes collected by the Funchal customs house (Alfândega do Funchal), foodstuffs excepted
- b) 6 per cent of the annual yield of the production tax on spirit (aguardente, distilled from sugar cane or wine) collected by the Agricultural Board of Madeira
- c) 50 per cent of any increase in the collection of direct taxes paid by taxpayers of the municipality of Funchal that are revenue of the District General Council, from the second half of the financial year in which the Board is instituted, relative to the highest amount reached by that collection in the same period of the three previous financial years
- d) 30 per cent of the yield of the municipal tax on domestic and foreign tobacco
- e) the revenue from the commercial operation of the harbour of Funchal (Porto do Funchal), the sale of land reclaimed from the sea, and the leasing of warehouses and of the said land or of other land that the Government or any other bodies may cede to the Board.
By a ministerial order (portaria) of 27 November 1915, the internal rules of the Autonomous Board, consisting of 25 articles, were approved. The Board also has internal regulations (regimento) for its Secretariat.
2Projects and earlier commission
The works foreman (condutor) Furtado de Mendonça, who served on the staff of the Board, published in 1915 a pamphlet entitled Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal. Memória descritiva e justificativa das obras projectadas, which contains the plans and designs for the works to be carried out in our harbour. This work, however, did not win the approval of the higher authorities.
Later the engineer Francisco Soares Júnior drew up a new project, which was submitted for assessment to the relevant technical department of the Ministry of Public Works (Ministério do Fomento) and which is said to be a study showing a special knowledge of the subject. It was published under the following title: Junta Autonoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal. Novo projecto das obras do porto artificial do Funchal. Memoria descritiva e justificativa. (Lisbon, 1921, 19 pp.).
Before this Autonomous Board was set up, a commission for the improvement of Funchal harbour had been appointed by the ministerial order (portaria) of 8 December 1911, and on 29 April 1912 it drew up a report on the works to be carried out. A member of this commission, the engineer Adriano Augusto Trigo, submitted an important study, which was published as a pamphlet under the title Breves Considerações sobre os melhoramentos de que carece o porto do Funchal. The commission was short-lived and, apart from the reports it presented, carried out no other work of note.
3Works, revenue and sources
As already stated, the Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto was created by the Decree of 13 August 1913. The decrees of 27 November 1915, 2 July 1926, 6 February 1934 and 5 September 1936 modified its original organisation and regulated the way it operated. This body was granted broader powers and new sources of revenue so that it could fulfil the purposes for which it had been created. In its first years of existence the Junta Autónoma confined itself to collecting its revenues, which served as the basis for the tender opened in March 1922 for the award of the contract, thus making a start on the works previously planned. This tender attracted no bidders, and a second was opened in January 1923; the contract for this construction was awarded to the firm ‘Fumasil Company Limited’, which was then formed in London. After lengthy debate in the press, petitions addressed to the central government, appeals to the courts, an opinion from the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic, etc., the contract between the Junta Autónoma and the ‘Fumasil Company’ was deemed rescinded in 1928, leaving the Junta free to open a new tender for the award of the contract for those works.
With the appointment of a technical director for the works to be carried out in the harbour of Funchal, the Autonomous Board for the Funchal Harbour Works (Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal) became far more productive. This was soon shown by the reinforcement of the breakwater protecting the mole (breakwater) between the islet and the Pontinha: between April 1930 and March 1931, 239 blocks with a volume of 4,784 m³ were built, at a cost of 590,000 escudos (Portuguese currency from 1911, = 1,000 réis). This improvement had to be carried out at once, because the great storm of 15 December 1926 had caused serious damage to the mole, putting it at risk of imminent and total destruction. Another improvement that local circumstances demanded even more urgently was the extension of the Cais da Entrada da Cidade (City Entrance Quay). A tender for the contract was opened and closed on 30 October 1930, and the construction was awarded to the firm Nederlandsche Maatschappij Voor Havenwerken for the sum of 4,763,000 escudos. The addition to the quay was to be 80 metres long and 16.4 metres wide, and to consist of five large blocks with a total volume of 3,337 cubic metres. The first block was set in place on 25 June 1932 and the fifth and last in January 1933. (See Cais (‘quay’)).
The Autonomous Board for the Funchal Harbour Works’s main source of revenue is the tax levied on imported tobacco, collected at the Funchal customs house. We give a summary of it for the years 1923 to 1932:
| Year | Tax (escudos) |
|---|---|
| 1923 | 24,930.79 |
| 1924 | 24,542.72 |
| 1925 | 2,147,068.71 |
| 1926 | 2,847,403.55 |
| 1927 | 3,086,744.47 |
| 1928 | 2,966,987.57 |
| 1929 | 2,838,127.89 |
| 1930 | 3,486,740.16 |
| 1931 | 3,836,731.01 |
| 1932 | 3,864,564.28 |
The staff of the Autonomous Board for the Funchal Harbour Works consists of an engineer-director, a head of accounts, a head of the secretariat, a clerk, a ‘foreman’ of the Cais da Pontinha (‘little point quay’), a timekeeper, a warehouse inspector and an office messenger. For a fuller account of this subject, readers should consult the articles Cais, Molhe da Pontinha and the harbour of Funchal in this Elucidário, as well as the following writings:
- Breves considerações sôbre os melhoramentos de que carece o porto do Funchal by the engineer Adriano Trigo, 1912
- Lei Organica da Junta, 1914
- Memória descritiva e justificativa das obras projectadas. . . by the engineer Furtado de Mendonça, 1915
- Lei Organica e Regulamento da Junta Autonoma, 1917
- Novo Projecto das obras do porto artificial do Funchal by Francisco António Soares, 1921
- Obras do Pôrto do Funchal, published by the Companhia das Obras do Porto, 1926
- Obras do Porto do Funchal, an opinion by three professors of the University, 1926
- A Questão do Porto do Funchal, a petition to the government, 1927
- Documentos relativos á questão do porto do Funchal, 1928
- Construção do prolongamento do cais da Entrada da Cidade, by the engineer Rodrigo António Machado Guimarães, 1933
- Protecção do quebra-mar da Pontinha, by the same, 1931
- Os Portos Maritimos de Portugal e Ilhas Adjacentes, vol. 5, by Adolfo Loureiro, 1910
- and Dicionário Corografico do Arquipelago da Madeira by Father Fernando Augusto da Silva.
In this article
Time
Years mentioned · 10-
A commission was appointed for the improvement of Funchal harbour.
-
The harbour commission issued its report on works needed at the port of Funchal.
-
The Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal was created by decree.
-
The internal regulations of the Junta Autónoma das Obras do Porto do Funchal were approved.
-
The Funchal harbour works contract was awarded to the Fumasil Company Limited.
-
A great storm badly damaged the Pontinha breakwater.
-
The Funchal harbour works contract with the Fumasil Company was declared rescinded.
-
239 concrete blocks were made to reinforce the Pontinha breakwater at Funchal harbour.
-
The first block of the extension of the quay at the entrance to Funchal was placed.
-
The last block of the Funchal city quay extension was placed.
Place
Places mentioned · 06
Abroad
- Cais da Entrada da Cidade
Funchal. Quay extended by 80 metres in 1932–33.
The Cais da Entrada da Cidade is Funchal's landing quay near Banger's pillar, where visitors disembarked, and it is the eastern starting point of the Pontinha road. It was extended by 80 metres in 1932–33.
- Campo Almirante Reis
Funchal. Eastern end of the planned seafront avenue.
Campo Almirante Reis, formerly Campo D. Carlos, is a square in the parish of Santa Maria Maior, Funchal, which now takes in the former Campo das Loucas. Football matches were played there, including the first organised match, and it also hosted beach bathing establishments, cycling festivals and the 1901 exhibition in pavilions. The yacht Anfitrite was under construction there in 1921; the square was the planned venue for the Quincentenary equestrian and sports games and the eastern end of the planned seafront avenue.
- Funchal
City whose harbour the board administered.
The capital of the archipelago and seat of the principal captaincy, where settlement began; it was made a vila c.1451–52. Its bay, the widest in the archipelago, lies between Ponta do Garajau and Ponta da Cruz and offers sheltered anchorage, though its harbour had never been studied oceanographically. The Elucidário discusses it as a health resort with climate data and records the January 1906 disturbances, the Danish prince's visit in May 1846 and recent volcanic cones in the area.
- London
United Kingdom. Where the contractor Fumasil Company was formed.
The British capital, the place of publication of many English works on Madeira, including those of the du Canes, Embleton and Bloxam. Mason compared its humidity with Funchal's, and artillery for the Fortress of São Tiago came from there. It hosted the 1909 applied chemistry congress.
- Pontinha
Machico. Site of the harbour breakwater whose repair was a main task of the board.
The Pontinha is the coastal projection at the western end of Funchal bay, originally called Ilhéus after two rocky islets later joined to the shore by walls and by the breakwater completed in 1889. The Elucidário traces its forts, chapel, lighthouse, passenger quay and road, storm damage in 1757 and 1892, and the maritime disinfection station there from 1901. It was the landing place of notable visitors such as the nuncio and the Archduchess Leopoldina. A locality of the same name is also listed among the main localities of Machico parish.
- Ribeira de Santa Luzia
Funchal. A small dock was planned near its mouth.
The Ribeira de Santa Luzia is one of the three streams crossing Funchal, named after a chapel of Santa Luzia on its left bank. Its banks were probably the first land irrigated by levadas and had four sugar mills in the late 17th century. It feeds the Santa Luzia, Moinhos and D. Isabel levadas, and the Jesuits' Fundoa residence stood on its right bank.
People
People mentioned · 06- Adolfo Loureirod. 1911
Author of Os Portos Marítimos de Portugal e Ilhas Adjacentes (1910), cited as a source.
- Adriano Augusto Trigob. 1862
Engineer on the 1911 harbour commission who wrote a 1912 study on Funchal port improvements.
-
Public-works conductor serving the board who published an unapproved harbour project in 1915.
-
Priest and author of the Dicionário Corográfico do Arquipélago da Madeira, cited as a source.
-
Engineer who drew up a new Funchal harbour project, published in Lisbon in 1921.
-
Engineer who wrote on the city quay extension (1933) and the Pontinha breakwater protection (1931).