The
Sixth Annual Meeting
March
17-19,2005
Port Said,Egypt
General
Information
Port
Said is a Port City, in North Eastern Egypt, at the Northern end of the
Suez Canal.
Situated largely on man-made land, the city was founded in 1859
on a slow sandy strip separating the Mediterranean
Sea from Lake Al-Manzalah. Mud and sand
dredged from the harbor and huge artificial stones capable of
resisting saltwater action were added to the strip. Its breakwaters
were completed in 1868, a year before the suez
Canal was completed. The city was named after
the Khedive Mohamed Said, who selected the site of the town.
Consisting initially
of a grid-pattern European quarter and an Egyptian sector, the
town early established its cosmopolitan character.
The outer harbor was designed so that its two protecting
moles prevent coastal currents from sitting up the canal. The
main channel is flanked by open basins. To house workmen of
several huge dry docks, a new quarter named Port Fouad was built
between 1903 and 1909, opposite the main city on the eastern
shore between the canal and the eastern extension of
Lake
al-Manzalah.
By
the 19th Century, Port Said became the world’s largest coal-bunkering station,
catering almost exclusively to the Suez Canal traffic. After the standard-gauge railway from
Cairo via Ismailia was completed in 1904, it
became Egypt’s chief port after
Alexandria. In addition to canal traffic;
it handled cotton and rice exports from the eastern delta. The city still retains the main workshops
of the canal administration.
