As revealed by John Armstrong, coastal shipping was vital to Britain’s Industrial Revolution: it was a system of mass transport for coal, grain, and myriad other goods that long predated railways and canals. Despite this, we know little about how it functioned. This paper examines some fundamental characteristics, namely ship speeds, times spent in port, and trade patterns, to examine its effectiveness long before Britain’s industrialisation. Local customs records provided data covering thousands of recorded departures and arrivals of coasters. These data are analysed using a geographical information system and panel-data analysis. Methods are described and new insights given. While seacoasts boasted opportunities, observed coasting vessels exhibit severe timing irregularities and clearly operated in very challenging seas where delays and troubles were to be expected.

中文翻译：

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麻烦之海？17 世纪英格兰和威尔士的航程时间和沿海航线

正如约翰·阿姆斯特朗 (John Armstrong) 所揭示的那样，沿海航运对英国的工业革命至关重要：它是一种运输煤炭、谷物和无数其他商品的大众运输系统，其远早于铁路和运河。尽管如此，我们对其运作方式知之甚少。本文考察了一些基本特征，即船速、在港口停留的时间和贸易模式，以检验其早在英国工业化之前的有效性。当地海关记录提供的数据涵盖了数以千计的过山车出发和到达记录。这些数据使用地理信息系统和面板数据分析进行分析。描述了方法并给出了新的见解。虽然沿海地区充满机遇，