The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

ork’s New anal Ready in 191 % Comparison of the old and new canals at Waterford, N. Y. SS WS KS KS A Clear Waterway from Buffalo to New York Will be Open for Traffic Next Year—Carry Lake Freight to Tidewater HE barge canals of New York state are not single or interrupted waterways. They embody a canal system. The work of construction is in charge of Frank M. Williams, New York state engi- neer and surveyor. The canal is now 95 per cent complete, being a clear waterway from Buffalo to New York, and being incomplete, as a barge canal, only for short stretches at Buffalo and Tonawanda. The season of 1918 will see this new canal system open for traffic, attracting freight from the fur- thermost portion of the Great Lakes, the ore and coal mines of the middle west, the great lumber districts, and the vast granaries of the continent. It makes possi- ble the transporting of these prod- ucts from their origin to the Atlan- tic seaboard without breaking bulk at any port. It is probable, how- ever, that some cargoes will be re-sorted and loaded at Buffalo, to The author f 435 By M. E. Mutchler continue in 1000 and 2000-ton barges to the sea coast and possibly be redistributed there. So much for the handling of raw materials in bulk. The State Barge canal passes through those portions of New York state destined to be the richest and most densely populated of the country. This canal traverses the busiest manufacturing towns; Syracuse, Rome, Utica, Rochester, the richest industrial cen- ters, all-of which practically owe their existence to the building of the original Erie canal. It takes in the numerous prosperous towns along the upper Hudson, and ends at modern new terminals in New York city. While preliminary steps have been taken to develop 150 x 22-foot steel barge, eight of which are building by the American Bridge Co., for the Shippers Navigation Co., of Syracuse.