CANAL TO GREAT LAKES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18101, 27 May 1922, Page 9

CANAL TO GREAT LAKES.

DEEPENING ST. LAWRENCE. AMERICA APPROVES SCHEME A. and N-Z. WASHINGTON, May 25. The United States Government lias advised the Canadian Government that it is ready to negotiate for an immediato treaty providing tor tho deepening of the St. Lawrence River to enable ocean-going ships to reach the Great Lakes. The Government estimates that the freight reductions will lower living costs per year by ten dollars per capita of those resident in the basin of the Great Lakes. A Bill to authorise tho construction of a 30ft. channel connecting tho Great Lakes with the sea, via the Welland Canal and the St. Lawrence River, was introduced in tho United States House of Representatives in January. It was proposed in the measure that tho expense should bo borno equally by the United States and Canada. An explanation of the proposal at the timo was as follows The proposal is strongly supported by Chicago and the Middle West, a score of State Legislatures having memorialised Congress in its favour. Opposition comes frorn tho North Atlantic Seaboard States, and principally from New York City, the New York barge canal at present enjoyirfr a monopoly in water transport from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic. In Canada, tho schemo has the support of Ontario, but is opposed by Montreal. It involves the deepening of the St. Lawrence for 180 miles abov© city namely, 113 miles of international boundary water from Lake Ontario to St. Regis and 67 miles of Canadian waterway from St. Regis to Montreal. It was submitted to the International Joint Commission in 1919.