The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1894-02-01
GREAT SHIP CANAL.
Detail Of the Plan Proposed
For That Across the
State.
ARGUMENTS IN IT'S FAVOR.
Engineering Difficulties to Be En-
countered-Its Value in
Time of War.
ARGUMENTS IN IT'S FAVOR.
spscia1 to the JERSEY csty Nsws.

S0Stt& ~
TRENTON, Feb. 1, 1S94.-The old-fogy cry
about the canal being a thing of the past
has lost its effect in recent years, and prob
ably nothing has lone so much to awaken
public interest in the subject sof inland
waterways as the recent opening OF the
t-hirty-fve-mile canal for which the English
city of Manchester paid SIS, 600, zoo, in order
to bring its harbor into direct connection
with the sea.
In the great Atlantic coast system of
waterways, which it is proposed shall even
tually extend from Boston to the Gulf OF
Mexico, the principal link, so far as Phila-
delphia is concerned, will be the ship canal
connecting that city with New York, cross
ing New Jersey from Bordentown, on the
Delaware River, to Raritan Bay. 1t is this
particular section of the work which is now
before Congress, the proposition for the
present being merely for an appropriation OF
$25, 600 for a survey of the line under Gov
eminent supervision.
The trip between Philadelphia and New
York by the existing route by way of the
Delaware River and Bay and up the New
Jersey coast covers a distance of 256 miles.
With the proposed canal in operation the
distance would be about Is miles, which
could be made in a twelve-hour run. This
inland route would also do away with the
host of maritime disasters which now attend
the coast-wise trade. During the past fiscal
year there were 214 wrecks between Massa-
chusetts and North Carolina, fifty-nine OF
which were total losses. The value of the
property totally destroyed was 81, 1885,
and there were twenty-four lives lost. Most
of this destruction occurred along the New
Jersey coast.
THE CANAL.
The canal across New Jersey, as now pro-
posed in the specifications before Congress,
will be 1874 miles in length. Starting at
B~ordentown, a short distance below Tren-
ton, ON the Delaware River, it will follow
the bed of the old Delaware and Raritan
Canal for a mile and a halt, then detecting
to the eastward of Trenton, it will again
join the old canal at a point ten and a half
miles out and follow it to the twentieth mile
post. Here it will leave the old route and
run parallel with the Rocky Hill Railroad to
Lawrence Brook, near Monmouth Junction;
here it will follow that stream to the Rari-
tan River east of New Brunswick, denouch-
ing into Raritan Bay, which is one of the
lower arms of New York Bay.
The engineering difficulties to be encoun-
tered would be slight, as most of the cutting
would be through the cretaceous clays, marls
and sands. The greatest elevation along the
lineis only seventy-six feet, and for the
greater portion of the route it follows the
fifty foot contour, suggesting that this be the
proper elevation for the summit level. There
will be six locks, two of twenty-five feet lift
each at either end of the summit level, and
a tide lock at both the Bordentown and
Raritan River ends. The drainage area for
supplying the canal with water comprises
over three hundred square miles. which will
have to be utilized by one or more feeders
and reservoirs, but which is estimated as
la.-~ ~, Vo,Ia ,1rp1u fny~ q FRO flo of of
least 30, 900, 600 tons.
IT'S STRATEGIC AND NAVAL VALUE.
One of the many strong arguments which
are being advanced for the building of the
canal is the great strategic and naval value
which it would possess in tihAe of war. By
means of the New Jersey canal the Govern
ment would nave direct inland communica-
ton between the two great Eastern naval
stations at Brooklyn and League Island, and
b ymeans of the proposed extension of the
canal system across the Delaware peninsula
and southwark to Florida, it would be pos
sible to quickly and safely move a flotilla to
and from any of the big cities on the Eastern
and Southern coast of the country, from
Boston to Galveston, in perfect safety from
any foreign feet stationed outside. 1t is
stated that the naval advantages Of the New
Jersey canal would alone go a long way to-
wards paying for it.
But the strongest argument in favor of the
New jersey Canal, and the one which has
appealed most emphatically to every branch
of the business and commercial community,
is the incalculable stimulus which it would
give to the trade of both Philadelphia and
New York, as well as the numerous smaller
cities and towns tributary to them. When
it is remembered that the cost o moving one
ton of freight a distance of one mile is three
mills by canal, as against FIVE mills by rail
road, it will readily be seen to what an ex-
tent a saving can be made upon the immense
quantity of merchandise which annually
,aasseS hetuean Rhiladelnhia and New York.