GIANT CANAL.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18618, 14 July 1930, Page 9

GIANT CANAL.

AMERICAN PROJECTS. Federal co-ordination of thousands of miles of rivers and canals in the United States is bringing about a renaissance in inland water-borne commerce. Rivers played a major role in the days when the steam packets plied the Mississippi. But to-day they are becoming an important unit in a balanced transport system in which rails, highways, and the air each carry the burdens for which they are best suited, says the “Christian Science Monitor.” The St. Lawrence Canal and the intracoastal waterway, two of the largest engineering projects ever conceived by man, are both now well on the way to completion. The St. Lawrence project will open up a landlocked empire to commence with the seven seas, and the golden harvest of the Canadian and American wheat fields will thereby find an outlet by sea from ports in Minnesota, 2300 miles inland. The intracoastal waterway, or inside Atlantic route,” while less spectacular, is nevertheless important, and provides a sort of oceangoing Mississippi river navigation system along the east coast of the United States. This salt water “Mississippi” will mean a service of cheap and dependable transportation from Boston to New , Orleans, and beyond to Corpus Christ!, Texas, for the seaboard States on the ; Atlantic. The aggregate of canals and water- ; ways, which have come to be grouped under the generic title of the “intracoastal waterway,” extends along the Atlantic coast from Boston southward. Freight may ply up and down the coast without suffering the rigours of the offshore storms. The waterway is j in process of development by the army engineers, and a major part of the undertaking is already complete. Beginning at Boston, the first sec- i tor is fhe Cape Cod Canal, which ; connects Buzzard's Bay by sea level to Cape Cod Bay, privately built and taken over by the Government in 1928, tolls free. Thence the route traverses Long* Island Sound to New York Bay. from which it follows the Raratan river, and the privately owned Raritan Canal to the Delaware river. It is here that the Federal Government is believed to be likely some day to increase facilities. The next step on the “inside route” runs through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canals, owned now by the Government; after that comes the Norfolk-Beaufort waterway, now practically complete. For 200 miles between Norfolk and Beaufort Inlet, N.C.. this canal offers a project depth of 12 feet. Then follows a stretch of 100 miles more from Beaufort to Cape Fear river, near Wilmington, N.C., where the project has been authorihed and work is under way. It is about one-fifth complete. Other Projects. But this is only the beginning. The Secretary of War has sent Congress a recommendation for an 8-foot waterway from Cape Fear river, North Carolina, over much of which are projects already authorised at other depths. This connects at the CharlestonBeaufort channel completed in 1929, and the Beaufort. S.S.-St. John’s river, Fla., project completed in 1926. And even this does not tell the whole story of the great “inside route,” for work has been going on for several months on the project from Jacksonville, Florida to Miami.

The last leg of the water highway system in Texas will cost the nation around 19,350,000 dollars. The St. Lawrence project has something of the dramatic quality of the Suez and Panama Canals. It will bring the Great Lakes 2300 from their western end—to the Atlantic, just as the Mississippi project will bring the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. With these two projects and the third intracoastal canal, just discussed, it will some day be possible for a boat to move completely around eastern North America, which will have become an “island” by the use of the steam shovel!

Completion of the St. Lawrence Canal, Henry J. Allen. Republican j Senator from Kansas, told the Great , Lakes-St. Lawrence Tidewater Associ- ; ation, of which he is president, last March, looks more hopeful than at any past time in ten years. The present move to connect the Lakes with the Atlantic began around 1919. and has seen much work already done. Canada Does Its Part. The Niagara peninsula has been cut by a 115.600.000 dollar New Welland ship canal, built by Canada. Likewise Canada has just entered on construction of 65 miles of ship channel from the outlet of Lake Ontario to the cities of Prescott and Ogdensburg. The project calls for the deepening and widening of the St. Lawrence above and below the international boundary for the free passage of deep draught vessels between the ocean and the Lakes. From the outlet of Lake Ontario for 113 miles down stream, and to Within 70 miles of Montreal, the St. Lawrence forms the international boundary. Two-thirds of the coast of the proposed improvement will occur in this one section. A single stage, 25-foot channel from Lake Ontario to Montreal will cost perhaps 170,000,000 dollars. To this cost must be added that of the Welland Canal, and another 50,000,000 dollars or so for the channel from the head of the Lakes to Lake Erie. In 1921 the international joint commission of the two Governments recommended the economic desirability of the canal. In 1926 the United States St. Lawrence Commission made a favourable report on engineering factors to the American Government, and the Canadian advisory committee performed a similar service to Canada. Diplomatic correspondence was initiated with the idea of writing a treaty to complete the work. In this note Canada proposed a tentative plan for construction. The last note on the subject came

from Canada on sth. April, 1928. It was explained that Dominion discussions of the problem would be required but that early action might be anticipated. Since then nothing formal has been done on the matter, but the United States stands ready to take up the subject again at Canada's convenience, while in the Dominion progress in construction on the Canadian sector has been made.