GREAT CANAL SCHEME.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19390, 27 July 1926, Page 9

GREAT CANAL SCHEME.

UNDERTAKING IN CANADA. LAKE HURON TO MONTREAL. A SIXTY MILLIONS PROJECT. [FROM OCR OWN CORRESPONDENT.] TORONTO. June 11. Tho activities, supported by Mr. Herbert, Hoover's lively interest, which aro seeking to promote great new waterways in the United States from Chicago to tho Gulf of Mexico and from Buffalo and Oswego to New York, have helped to stimulate interest in Canada in the Georgian Bay Ship Canal, an ambitious project. which lias been hanging fire for a generation. Enthusiasts declare that tho Georgian Bay scheme would in its effect eclipse both tho Mississippi and the New York State enterprises. Even th-t proposed deepened St. Lawrence waterway would be overshadowed. The Georgian Bay ship canal would connect tho North-East corner of Georgian Bay, that is, Lake Huron, by way of French River, now famous among tourists, Lake Nipissing, and tho Ottawa River, with Montreal. Tho total length is but 448 milf>«, including only 40 miles

of real canal, 55 miles of dredged channel and 353 mills of wide and deep river

navigation, thanks to those sturdy inland rivers, the French and. the Ottawa. Under this scheme a real connection between Atlantic Ocean navigation and tho Great Lakes, a dream of all generations almost since the discovery of America, will be accomplished by building 40 miles of canal. This will provide a channel 25ft. deep, accommodating vessels up to 15.000 tons.

If tho Georgian Bay schemo becomes a reality, the shades of Champlain, Brule La Salle, Verendrye and of her earliest explorers of inland America will exult. ■The Georgian Bay route was their highway. When they found their way to China blocked by rapids on tho St. Lawrence they explored the Ottawa and following tho trail of previous generations of Indians came out on Georgian Bay, thus discovering for civilisation tho amazing inland seas now known as tho Great Lakes. Tho first white man who beheld even Lake Ontario reached it from (Montreal by tho Georgian Bay routo travelling over seven 05 eight hundred miles to reach a point only a quarter that distance away.

History ol tho Undertaking. More than 20 years ago tho Canadian Parliament passed art Act incorporating the Montreal, Ottawa and Georgian Bay Canal Company for the purposo of proceeding with tho project. Tho promoter was Sir Robert Perks, a distinguished English capitalist. Though tho company was granted an exclusive navigation franchise and at that time incalculable water power rights it was not prepared to go ahead without Government assistance, either in the way of subsidy or guarantee of bonds which might have added obligations to the Dominion of one or two hundred million dollars. The Canadian public has never been in any humour to embrace anv such obligation for a scheme which, if it thought about it at all, it regarded as more or less fantastic and chimerical. Now Canadian capitalists have taken over the interests of Sir Robert Perks and they are prepared to go ahead with the project without any Government assistance at all. As a result the schemo assumes an entirely different aspect. The underlying factors which in tfie last decade have brought tho Georgian Bay schemo from tho land of dreams into the broad daylight of practicality are two in number; the immense development of freight traffic in Western Canada and United States pressing for an outlet to the sea and tho revolutionary growth in demand for water power. The Georgian Bay route is a new empiro in water power apart altogther from its ship business. It embraces, according to the lowest estimates, 1.000,000 horse power; some say it may be twice that figure. Magnitude of Scheme. As a power scheme it will overshadow Niagara or the Saguenay. The waterfalls of the Ottawa River at Chaudiero, nearby Parliament Hill at Carillon and elsewhere, are famous and its rapids inspired the best known boat song in the world: Blow, breezes, blow, the stream runs fast, The rapids are near and the daylight, a past. A couplet which is now acquiring a commercial significance undreamt of by the poet. The magnitude of the project is partially indicated by its estimated cost of £60,000,000. Of this roughly two-thirds-will be for canalisation and onethird for power development. The height of land that ships have to get over to pass from the St. Lawrence River near Montreal to the Georgian Bay, via the Ottawa Valley, is 661 ft. above the St. Lawrence level. From 23 to 27 locks will be required to hoist the ships to the higher" levels. The Ottawa River will have to be dammed in about 16 places. The summit is a short distance tc the east of Lake Nipissing and west of the Ottawa River at Mattawa. Georgian Bay is only 100 ft. below the height of land. Three or four locks only will be necessary to get down to Georgian Bay. Ten years is estimated as tho time necessary to carry out the work.

The company plans to recoup itself by charging a toll of a dollar a ton on the freight using the lihip channel, which is expected would yield a revenue of £4,000,000 a year. The cost of operating would he £340,000 a year, leaving £3,660,000 for interest on the cost of construction. As power is developed and sold the freight toll may he reduced.

It is calculated that the saving to shippers would be greater than the revenue of the company, the reduction in freight rates on grain alone, after paying toll, working out to more than £3,400,000 a year. The saving on grain would be at least 4 cents a bushel.

The time of transit, it is estimated, would be 70 hours, a saving of 22 hours as compared with the St. Lawrence route and 31 hours as compared with the Hudson River route. This route would be 282 miles shorter to Montreal from ?or William than any other and 766 miles shorter than the best United States route The Canadian interests who now control the company have filed their plans with the Government and are prepared to begin work at an early date as soon as the Government has registered approval. While subsidies are no longer involved, , the Government will pnbably review the project in all its important ramifications, domestic and international.