1. The earliest famous wharf in Wuhan is Tianbao Lane Wharf in Hankou, which was built on the Hanshui River in 1736 (the first year of Qingganlong). The maximum tonnage of wooden boats moored at the dock is about 900 tons. But before that, Wuhan became an important transportation hub and strategic location because of the Yangtze River crossing east and west and the Hanshui River connecting north and south. In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, with the development of commodity economy, Hankou became a famous commodity distribution center in the central region.
2. Before the Opium War, the north bank of Hanshuikou was called "Eight Wharfs of Twenty Miles Long Street". Merchant ships in Hubei, Jiangxi, Sichuan and other provinces, Xiajiang merchants and Huizhou merchants who come to China for trade have berths. At that time, there were always 24,500 ships moored on both sides of the Hanshui River, which was a busy scene. The Qing dynasty once called it "the city that never sleeps" with the poem "ten miles sail according to the city and thousands of households are brightly lit".