Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/305660 
Year of Publication: 
2024
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 17218
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Sailing ships persisted on emigrant voyages to Australia until the late nineteenth century and passage durations decreased by three weeks from the late 1840s to the mid-1880s. The shortening of voyages by sail has been linked to improvements in navigation and in sailing ship technology but without quantitative estimates. Analysis of 311 voyages of emigrant ships that sailed directly from a UK port to Adelaide from 1848 to 1885 shows that the decline in voyage duration was associated with increases in tonnage, iron construction and, above all, clipper-style ship design. Advances in ship technology also enabled captains to take fuller advantage of sailing the so-called great circle route to Australia. Examining a unique dataset of the tracks of 290 voyages from Europe to Melbourne in 1854-62, I find that larger and clipper-style ships reduced voyage durations, both directly, because they were faster on a given track, and indirectly, because they could better exploit the great circle route.
Subjects: 
colonial Australia
sailing ships
voyage durations
JEL: 
F22
N77
O33
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.