The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER MONDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1913. CANAL SCHEMES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 35, 10 February 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER MONDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1913. CANAL SCHEMES.

With the progress made of late towards the completion of the Panama Canal, it is not surprising to find schemes for other canals coming to the front. According to the special engineering correspondent of a leading English journal, one such scheme for a ship canal—across Scotland has advanced some way from the early stages of vague generalisations, whilst another to • connect the German Rhine with the sea, wholly through German territory, is being seriously discussed. A few years ago a. bold and imaginative engineer proposed a ship canal across the North of England from the Tyne to the Solway. The special feature of this canal was to be a tunnel of tremendous cross section, through the lulls and mountains of the Pennine Chain. All these schemes are quite eclipsed by a proposal for a trans-Canadian canal connecting the Atlantic with the Pacific, which Mr T. LaurenceHamilton proposes. This proposal is not quite so absurd as appears at first sight, although the difficulties are obviously enormous and perhaps insuperable. At present ships drawing as much as about fourteen feet of water can penetrate from the Atlantic to the western end of Lake Superior, which is almost exactly halt the distance from ocean to ocean. This section of the route is mostly by the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence. The canal portion is quite small, and is being improved. From Lake Superior to Western Alberta, rather more than two-thirds of the remaining distance, there is a waterway consisting main! y of the Saskatchewan river and its connections. It is at present used to a small extent by steamers. In British Columbia there are considerable stretches of navigable rivers and lakes, but there remains the continental divide of the Rock Mountains. Whether or not sneh a trans-continental waterway conld compete with the radways is questionable; lint the relative insignificance of the great inland river system of the United States as carriers, it is considered, is not a fair comparison, as these run north and south instead of east and west as required by the traffic.