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\* ¦ R8 THE GLOB )BEAND MAIL, THURSDAY, JUNE 25, Welland bypassl half completed through town By ALBERT SIGURDSON Globe and Mail Reporter ST. CATHARINES - The $110-million project to bypass a narrow, curved section of the Welland canal through the town of Welland is half completed. Started in 1967, excavation of the 30-foot-deep, 350-foot-wide, eight-mile section is about 80 per cent completed, and excavation for a tunnel to carry road and rail traffic under the new canal has been finished. The reinforced concrete bottom plate has been poured in the tunnel and the sides have been started. Captain G. B. Lodge of Canada Steamship Lines Ltd. in Montreal says the bypass, 110 feet wider than the old, should remove much of the tension from transiting this section. Some speeding up o£ traffic should result. Work costing $60-million has been completed and there are only three major contracts pending, according to A. C. Bunbury, deputy director of construction for the St. Lawrence Seaway Authority. Two of these are in bidding. They are: one for the remaining mile of channel excavation and one for each of the two approaches to the tunnel. C. A. Pitts (Ontario) Ltd. and McNamara Construction Co. Ltd., both of Toronto, have a joint venture contract for the tunnel, and also a separate contract for four steel bridges over the s tunnel approaches. * The tunnel will carry two lanes of road traffic and three railway lines. [New terry service to Yarmouth & Maine YARMOUTH, N.S. (CP) -A Swedish line that runs ships between Germany and England and cruises out of South America has inaugurated a new ferry link across the Gulf of Maine between Portland. Me., and this southwestern Nova Scotia port. The $8,000,000 Prince of Fundy, just off the ways at Bremerhaven, Germany, carried a capacity passenger list on her maiden voyage. She got an enthusiastic sendoff at Portland Saturday night and an even more energetic welcome here Sunday morning. The 5,000-ton gleaming white ship plying a route used for 125 years, can carry 1,000 passengers and 200 cars. The original ferry carried only a handful of tourists and some commodities. The pioneer tourists hired their transportation at local livery stables. Keystone Contractors Ltd. of Windsor has completed its contract for three-quarters of a mile of channel, and Piter Kiewit Sons Co. of Canada -Ltd., Toronto, has completed two contracts totalling two miles of excavation. Alnor Earth Moving Ltd. of Oshawa has nearly completed another three-quarter-mile section. C. A. Pitts Eastern Ltd. and Drake Construction Co. Ltd. of Toronto, in a joint venture, have completed about 80 per cent of a further three-quarter-mile contract. Another Pitts company—C. A. Pitts General Contractor Ltd.—has a joint venture with Atlas Construction Co. Ltd. of Montreal for about a mile of excavation and also to build a culvert to carry the Welland River under the new ship channel. The new roads and highways will be built by the municipalities and other services will be moved mainly by the companies that own them with costs charged to the Seaway. The main New York-Chicago line of the Penn Central Co. of Philadelphia passes through the area and will be one of the rail lines relocated. Others belong to Canadian National Railways and to the Toronto, Hamilton and Buffalo Railway Co., in which CP Rail has an interest. Whether the old channel will be filled in or left as it is has not yet been decided. The new channel and tunnel are scheduled to be ready for the opening of the 1973 navigation season.