You can't queue in the sense of ordering a yard to build different ships one after another. What you can do is say "Build x of y" and then one factory will build them in order. If you want to build say four cruisers in a rush, do not do a Build of 4 order, instead Build 1 ship and issue that order four times to assign 4 factories.
The speed values given are the length of time a ship takes to move from one position to another. Speed/5 = seconds of transit time. Ships only move one sector per warp movement interval.