The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-01-02
BUILT FOR THE FU4 URE.
Ultinf te Design, Great ship Canal
to the Gulf


Chicago, Jan. 2.-Probably no public
work has ever been undertaken by any
other state or municipality which from
it's very incs sption, was designed to do
SO much for the navigable and COM
merciai interests of the country as the
Chicago canal. The requirement of law
which compelled the construction of
rock sections to meet the demands Of
the next generation was wises for it has
laid the foundation of a man5moth ship
canal, connecting the great lakes with
the Mississippi river and the gulf and
saving the sanitary district of Chicago
and the federal government the great
expense that would in the future be
necessary in rock-excavatiOn land blast
ing under the flowing water The canal,
if confined by law to the single require
ment of disposing of Chicago sewage,
could have been constructed for from
$12 O00, ,000 to $14,000,00c, so the sanitary
district can justly claim to have eX-
pe nded at least $4,000, 600 in the direc-
tion of the great navigable water way
The proceedings of congressiswill show
that, in the last 10 years OF petitions
and demands for congress, oral appro-
Iriations for harbors and canals and
public Improvements 10 petitipning city
or cOrnmounity has contributed for
purely commercial purposes five per
cent of the amount which this sanitary
district has contributed toward the
commercial waterway to connect the
great lakes with the ATuiI OF mexico.
AS an engineering triumph, the great
interest in the Chicago canal lies in
the fact that it disposes Of the sewage
of this city in a manner contrary to
the laws of nature and contrary to the
laws of gravity. The common law of
England from the days OF the conquest,
when customs began to be moulded in
to laws, down to the present time and
indeed the laws and customs of the
Latin races as we'll, have recognized in
49, ekrn IF de- f7a
natural outlet of the sewage of all pop
ulous communities. Were the city of
Chicago situated upon the Illinois river,
or were the entire area of the city even
situated in the natural watershed of the
Desplaines river, there would be no sig
nificance in the plans forever to turn
the sewage of the city down the valley
of the DeSDfaines and Illinois rivers;
but the uniqueness of the canal plan is
that it restores Typographical conditions
existing in prehistoric times-when the
overflow water, if indeed not all waters
of the great lake region flowed down
the Mississippi Valley by making q
cut through the glacial drift and rock
between Chicago and Lockport of an
average depth of about 35 feet. in order
to once more restore the gravity flow
from Lake Michigan to the Desplaines
and Illinois valleys.
It is not because a canal has been
constructed, but because a canal has
been constructed which dive.ts the sew
age of the city of Chicago from it's nat
urai outlet through the Chicago river
into the lake to an artificial outlet from
the Chicago river into the Dasplaines
and Illinois, that lies the contention of
the citizens of Illinois and Mississippi
valleys against this artificial channel
in contradiction to the inherent right
of communities to dispose Of sewage by
the natural gravity flow of the country.
While the Chicago river has been
deepened and widened in order to in
crease its flow and capacity, the canal
itself, properly speaking. begins at the
south branch of the Chicago river at
Robey street and continues southwark
as an entirely artificial channel until it
reaches the controlling works at Lock
port, a distance Of % miles, of entirely
artificial construction.
AT Lockport the channel wfdens to
about 500 feet into a windage basin in
which the large lake vessels can be
easily turned and manoeuvere6. The
fall from the mouth of the Chicago riv-
er &C; the Lockport works-and be it re-
mensbered that henceforth the Chicago
river viii flow UP stream as commonly