The lumber used was mainly pine and tamarack which contained a natural creosote. Caissons formed of square timber and filled with earth and stone were used as permanent piers. Different types of Coffer Dams, watertight walls of timber filled with clay, were used only during the construction in order to exclude water from portions of the river beds. Both techniques were used by architects and engineers. Air-tight caissons were used extensively in the 1850s.
Early maps show the wharves in a square shape.
Caissons piers were added to certain square wharves extending them into a rectangular shape. There is indication that concrete was in use in Hawkesbury as early as the 1820s. Industrial concrete wharves were found in Hawkesbury in the 1860s and in Rockland in the 1880s. The wooden wharves had a normal life span of about 50 years mainly because of the inclement weather. They constantly had to be repaired or rebuilt.