The Port of Borg is located in Gamle Fredrikstad in southeast Norway about 71 kilometers southeast of the Port of Drammen and 79 kilometers south-southeast of the Port of Oslo. With an excellent natural harbor protected by Krakeroy Island, the Port of Borg is open all year. In 2007, over 71 thousand people called the Port of Borg and Gamle Fredrikstad home.
Gamle Fredrikstad’s main industries include shipping, sawmilling, and fishing. The Port of Borg exports lumber, granite, chemicals, and feldspar. The area around the Port of Borg and Gamle Fredrikstad has many stone monuments, rock carvings, and graves that date to the Stone Age.
King Frederik II of Denmark founded Gamle Fredrikstad in 1567, and it received municipal status in 1838. Combined with nearby Sarpsborg, Fredrikstad is Norway’s fifth largest city. Built at the mouth of the Glomma when, during the Northern Seven Years’ War, the Swedes burned down Sarpsborg 15 kilometers upstream, the old town on the river’s east bank is the best-preserved fortified town in Northern Europe.
King Frederik established the new town to replace Sarpsborg at a better location for trade and commerce. Eventually made permanent, a temporary fortification was built there in the mid-1600s during the Tortenson War between Denmark-Norway and Sweden.
Over the next 60 years, several new fortifications were built at the Fredrikstad Fortress. A new suburb, Vestsiden, was established 1735. The new suburb grew more rapidly than the older city, and Vestsiden became the functional city center.
Timber exporting began in the Port of Borg and Fredrikstad in the 1840s, and twenty years later, several steam-powered saws were located on the river. In 1879, the railroad arrived, and the city began to grow.
When timber exports began to decline in the early 20th Century as a result of modern wood-processing techniques, Fredrikstad industries changed to other products, and the Port of Borg changed its trade cargoes. The Port of Borg grew famous for its big shipyard, the Fredrikstad Mekaniske Verksted.
Review and History Port Commerce Cruising and Travel Satellite Map Contact Information
