It was capable enough to support more than 50,000 US and Australian forces during WW2, with a far smaller local population and industry base.
A force many times larger than would be the case today, even if the whole RAN was based there...
Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates
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A force many times larger than would be the case today, even if the whole RAN was based there...
But it wasn't that many pages ago in this thread many posted, not me, how FBW near Perth wasn't the east coast. Perth is much larger than Townsville.
If there has to be a relocation to base the amphibious ships if Sydney is too crowded, I suggest Brisbane would be a better location metro-wise not fully aware of the space available at Brisbane. Its my opinion the larger the metro population the better career opportunities lie for the military spouses...
I have seen and heard much about career opportunities for military spouses in many of the US air force base communities. Its not pretty living in Mountain Home, ID or Altus, OK, a long ways from a college/university. Its when I would appreciate being a Coastie based in a large metropolitan area such as Houston/Galveston, Texas. You can't even find a barber school in either location...
I’m right in assuming you aren’t Australian and have little familiarity with this country? Townsville has one of the lowest unemployment rates in Australia. Spousal employment would be the least of the Navy’s worries to base an amphib fleet there. Certainly punch ups in the town centre with the Army would be a much bigger problem.
Townsville is not Mountain Home or Altus. It is the 13th largest city in Australia and north of Brisbane the largest city. The 13th largest city in the USA is San Francisco. Would you have a problem basing navy ships in SF? It is also the unofficial capital of the unofficial state of North Queensland. They have their own NRL team. They certainly have a university and all sorts of mod cons.
The biggest problem is the lack of a ship repair industry. There is one in Cairns 300 km to the north but not Townsville. But Port of Townsville is rapidly expanding and a Panamax dock would be a strategic investment. Would also support bulker ship repair (for Townsville, Mackay, Gladstone etc all very busy bulk export ports) and provide an emergency facility to support Great Barrier Reef disaster management.
A panamax dock is a big investment and needs support of material and staff or it will simply not be comerically attractive unless the ship is really broken and there are no other options. This tends to be easier in larger centers with shorter and more logisitical support mechanisms. However, even in these centers few commercial ships use Asutralian docks if the can get to Singapore or the Phillipines which is significantly cheaper.
On this basis a large dock in Townsville may end up only being used for emergecy repair (if the ship cannot move or be towed elsewhere) for commercial vessels and for naval use, if that is why it is built. I may be wrong but I suspect ot would run at a loss if seeking to be commercially viable.
The other issue is ports such as Gladstone have a bigger shipping task than Townsville and a commercial dock would be better to be located there if traffic was the issue (noting this is 550km for Brisbane). I am not suggesting this is a good idea.
Finally for a commercial faciltiy it is relevant to note that a lot of the commerial trafic going to NE Queensland is moving beyond panamax (65000 to 80000 tonnes) to post panamax and Capesize (from around 175000 DWT tonnes to an upper limit now approaching 400000 DWT tonnes).
Not quite, CN stated in a signal a few months ago that the majority of crews based on LHD's/LSD and AWD would become specialized on that particular platform for the majority of their career. When posted ashore, they would go into SPO billets supporting the platform they came off. Thus any major amphibs based in NQLD, the sailors wouldn't get much chance of rotation to other bases.
Mind you, being a CSO I would have loved the chance to be based in Darwin or Cairns
Cheers
Obviously, you didn't read the part of my post which mentioned population densities. It includes counties & a 'city' with population densities equal to or lower than the state of Victoria, & one with about the same density as New South Wales. That's a bizarre definition of an urban area.
The contiguous (on a generous definition) urban area has about 1 million people.
You also ignored what I said about the size of the fleet, & the units, based there. What should we divide it by, to get the equivalent of the RAN & its largest units? I'd say at least 10. Apply that, & we end up with something no bigger than Townsville. Way-hay, problem solved!
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With 6000 defence personnel already in Townsville (~10% of the ADF), I don't think the sky is going to fall if another few hundred Navy families are added.
Tee_Centre_10
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I would like to point out that Townsville (186,000) is not Portsmouth (207,000), Toulon (170,000) or Norfolk (242,000). Nor is it Kiel (240,000), Taranto (191,000) or even the diminutive Wilhelmshaven (81,000). All of these cities are port cities that support naval forces with a long and established maritime history and the long-term investment and infrastructure to support a fleet or large fleet units.
Townsville is a port, yes, but to my knowledge (and I'm willing to be corrected by someone more knowledgeable) other than minor repairs everything else has gone south to Brisbane (or further) for repair, especially if it requires docking. I don't think Townsville has ever been able to dock anything larger than a corvette.
None of this is to say it can't support the LHDs now (especially as anything major could be done down south), just that it hasn't been required to support large vessels before because Townsville has historically been more of an Army/Air Force town, even during WW2.
winnyfield
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You're thinking of Langley AFB - probably about twice as big as RAAF Amberley.. CIA HQ @ Langley, Virginia is located about 10km north-west of the Pentagon.
btw/ the main USMC units at Camp Lejeune are located about 5 hours (road) south of Norfolk
Map of where US defence industries are located: Top Secret America: Interactive map | washingtonpost.com
The port of Townsville has 9 berths, 3 of which are capable of handling bigger ships than the LHD's.
3 Brigade has been embarking and disembarking at the Port of Townsville since the Vietnam war when HMAS Sydney "Vung Tau Ferry" used to take them over there.
It's plenty big enough even without development (which it would need to house them permanently) to handle the Canberra Class and more than experienced enough at loading and unloading military RORO vessels.
http://www.townsvilleport.com.au/component/option,com_content/task,view/id,43/Itemid,115/
All of you cynics are being a bit misleading with metro population area figures as Toulon is in the Provence region of France which has a population of 4.5 million, Wilhemshaven is in the Lower Saxony state of Germany which has a population of 8 million, Taranto is in the Apuila region of Italy which has a population of 4.1 million, and Portsmouth is in Hampshire County of the United Kingdom which has a population of 1.7 million.... None of these regions, counties, or states are large in size, all are much smaller than the size of the island state of Tasmania....
Individual cities may not add up to a significant number, but metropolitan areas of major cities and regions do...
I am not familiar with the real estate business of Townsville, but are there thousands of available homes on the market for a few hundred military families to choose from? Or do the military families get stuck with the leftovers others refuse to live in?
Having asked tough questions, I am sure if Australia chose to relocate to Townsville the government would make sure there will be sufficient housing... But there is much more than housing to question. For example, are the nearby schools able to handle a sudden increase in enrollment nearby? I live in a fast growing area and know many of the independent school districts in the area I live in require more schools and classrooms. The area is building them as fast as they can but can not keep up with the demand. To meet the demand they have gone to two shifts, something I find disturbing with education today. Which brings us back to spouses careers....
The Army is currently in the process of moving 3 RAR and a few other odds and bobs - about a thousand soldiers - from Sydney to Townsville. It is absolutely not a big deal.
It's also why I'm glad I bought a house in Townsville before all the riff raff arrived.
Dammit, man, can't you let go of this?
You referred to a city, not a county like Hampshire (which I can cycle right across from here, just north of its border, to the south coast without entering a town, through pleasant countryside & scattered villages), or a state like Niedersachsen or a region like Provence, which have lower population densities than Italy. You can ski in Provence (it includes major ski resorts, e.g. Serre Chevalier), or hike through the mountains in summer & not see anyone all day - but maybe some chamois. You can hunt deer & wild boar in Puglia, & there's a local timber industry. Most of Niedersachsen is farmland
You might as well say "Taranto is in the nation of Italy which has a population of 60 million", or "Wilhelmshaven is in Germany which has a population of 82 million".
These are not cities, or metropolitan areas.
Tee_Centre_10
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Sorry for my lack of clarity, when I said "docking" I meant taking the LHD out of the water for repair/maintenance. However, anything based in Townsville could go down to Cairncross Dry Dock in Brisbane.
Like Darwin, Port of Townsville is expanding with construction of a new outer harbour so things won't be so cramped for large amphibious visits post-2015.
Perhaps the Navy has been a bit spoiled at FBE by having the ability to dry dock on site, but they seem to cope at FBW without anywhere to dry dock Sirius, and it is further from Perth to Sydney than Townsville to Brisbane (or even Sydney).
Going back to basing issues at FBE, there is just going to have to be more rafting up with vessels getting...cosy.
I was browsing some historic RAN images I had saved and came across these (see attached aerial views of Garden Island, with the colour one I think taken from the hammerhead crane).
Perhaps October 1986 was just a taste of the future?
I dunno, looks how a navy port should look, busy. I remember going down there in the 80's a lot as a kid, wonderful site. Now most of the ships are gone and the ones that are there usually look pretty hammered (tobroken?). Rusting away while I eat pie and peas.
Which is I suppose one reason I want the LHD in sydney. It used to be a good thing the people of Australia could actually see the navy and her ships. All this talk of moving everything north preludes FBE closing down and being sold off for millionaire housing (which local councils think we have massive shortage of), housing for people with to much money. Which of course will go something like HMAS Platypus, vacant site for 20-30 years, then they will just end up pouring concrete 10m thick all over it and using it for raves or millionair housing etc.
Sydney used to be the heart of the navy, but with FBW ever expanding and the subs gone I think its lost some of that. The city is the worse for it. Some new massive mining operation will open up near townsville (or oil and gas offshore), and guess what, there will be all sorts of retention problems etc. People will gladly give up $20-$30k+ to live in Sydney, it has its own retention bonus. If you remove the possibility of people ever being able to locate to Sydney then I think it will have a much wider impact. For example Im sure if they had some subs in Sydney there would be not be any manning issues.
Which is I suppose one reason I want the LHD in sydney. It used to be a good thing the people of Australia could actually see the navy and her ships. All this talk of moving everything north preludes FBE closing down and being sold off for millionaire housing (which local councils think we have massive shortage of), housing for people with to much money. Which of course will go something like HMAS Platypus, vacant site for 20-30 years, then they will just end up pouring concrete 10m thick all over it and using it for raves or millionair housing etc.
Sydney used to be the heart of the navy, but with FBW ever expanding and the subs gone I think its lost some of that. The city is the worse for it. Some new massive mining operation will open up near townsville (or oil and gas offshore), and guess what, there will be all sorts of retention problems etc. People will gladly give up $20-$30k+ to live in Sydney, it has its own retention bonus. If you remove the possibility of people ever being able to locate to Sydney then I think it will have a much wider impact. For example Im sure if they had some subs in Sydney there would be not be any manning issues.
Tee_Centre_10
Member
I don't think anyone wants or expects FBE to be closed (except for State Gov + Tourism twonks + Rich People with Rich People Problems) or evacuated North. Just wouldn't be practical, desirable or affordable.
Besides, military services like heritage and traditions (within reason) and are firmly and often emotionally attached to sites that have traditional and historical meaning to their services, so I could not imagine any Navy service person would feel happy at losing GI as FBE. I could imagine them calling in NGS on Russell Offices.
I think the Townsville discussion is more about the unique case of amphibious units, and the desirability or otherwise of having them co-located with the Army units (Inf and Av) that they would use them. While there are pros and cons on the idea, the discussion is purely theoretical and the LHDs will be based in Sydney. I believe there is a refurb project for FBE in order to base the LHDs there, so it seems it is going to be home for the foreseeable future.
Besides, military services like heritage and traditions (within reason) and are firmly and often emotionally attached to sites that have traditional and historical meaning to their services, so I could not imagine any Navy service person would feel happy at losing GI as FBE. I could imagine them calling in NGS on Russell Offices.
I think the Townsville discussion is more about the unique case of amphibious units, and the desirability or otherwise of having them co-located with the Army units (Inf and Av) that they would use them. While there are pros and cons on the idea, the discussion is purely theoretical and the LHDs will be based in Sydney. I believe there is a refurb project for FBE in order to base the LHDs there, so it seems it is going to be home for the foreseeable future.
Townsville is certainly going to be one of the places the LHD's will need to visit but I'm not convinced of basing all the amphib up at townsville. Given FBE continued importance, avalibility of other assets etc I personally see Sydney as the logical home port (I will admit lacking objectivity in it).
Also I see having a complete range of assets home ported in Sydney would allow greater training involving all assets, which is one reason why we should have some subs ported at FBE.
Certainly upgrade the hell out of townsville. Perhaps even have an amphib based up there perhaps on a rotational basis. But this shouldn't come at the cost of upgrading GI and naval sites around sydney, particularly for the amphibs.
Also I see having a complete range of assets home ported in Sydney would allow greater training involving all assets, which is one reason why we should have some subs ported at FBE.
Certainly upgrade the hell out of townsville. Perhaps even have an amphib based up there perhaps on a rotational basis. But this shouldn't come at the cost of upgrading GI and naval sites around sydney, particularly for the amphibs.
I think it is USS New Jersey BB-62.Why what is that beautiful ship in the back ground
Good pic.
Not sure if USS Missouri ever visited Sydney (BB-63)
oops just noticed where you are from!
You are a tease
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