Although very conveniently sited for passengers, Ramsgate Harbour station presented severe operating difficulties.
Working motorboats include ferries, fishing boats, motor barges, tugs, coasters, passenger boats, police and harbour officials' launches, fuel and water boats, fire-fighting craft, and many others.
James Stockan, chairman of the council's development and infrastructure committee, said: "The overall economic gain to Orkney of almost £3.1m, through harbour dues, passenger tours, and spending at tourist sites and on the high street, is a fantastic achievement in the current hard financial times.
Overall visitor expenditure was worth £16.4 million in 2006, in which year just under 26,000 cruise liner passengers arrived at Lerwick Harbour.
Because there are no wharves or natural harbours, passengers and cargo are shuttled by barge between oceangoing vessels and a small artificial anchorage.
There are shops and restaurants in the pedestrianised Hope Square and Brewers Quay, which are linked to the town centre by town bridge and a small passenger ferry service across the harbour.
For centuries the harbour was a passenger terminal and trade and cargo port: goods handled included wool and spices, and in the 20th century Weymouth was a bulk importer of fertiliser and cars.
Joe, the boatman, counted the passengers on board at the harbour, and as we chugged passed Horse Island and out in to the inky blue Atlantic, he explained that the storm in the previous few days had left a powerful swell.
A seasonal foot passenger ferry service runs from the harbour to Lundy Island, and the Balmoral, the Waverley and pleasure boats ply to Porthcawl near Swansea.
From 1972 to 2006, the ferry was still used by many as the shortest route from Tsim Sha Tsui (TST) to Central District, and a daily average of 74,000 passenger trips were made across the harbour in 2004.
