Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-02-24
Waterway Improvements.

This statement has peculiar applica
ton to the river and harbor bill which
now has passed the House There the
Ohio river improvemenr, to cost $63, 900
00O. is entered upon and all appropriation
made for its continuing. The same thing
is true of the improvement of the Missis-
sippi from st. Paul to ST. Louis, and the
same river from ST. Louis to Carlo; and
of the Missouri river from Kansas City
to ST. Louis. These projects seem TO be
warranted by the traffic in sight.
while / am dealing with the Panama
canal. however, / ought to refer to the
discrepancy between the estimated cost
of the enterprise and the actual cost, as
we are now able to fix it, with very
considerable ac1urancy. within four or five
years of its completion.
'"rhe estimated cost of the engineering
and construction of the canal was $780,
100000 Its actual cost for engineering
and construction will be S2g7 ,Up,OOO an
increase of about Sl57,30QO00. This in
crease is to be explained, first, by the
very great appreciation in the cost of
labor and material between the time
when the estimate was made, in 1900.
and the time when the work
was done between 1894 and 1909;
second by the fact that the
canal had been enlarged substantially
beyond the original dimensions estima ted
for.
You know that the great work of ex-
cayatiOn in the canal is called the Guile
bra cut. This is where the backbone of
the continent reduced to its lowest height
is cut through in order to permit the
flowing of the canal, and through five
miles of that cut which altogether is
about nine miles long, for purposes of
economy the original plan and estimate
made the bottom of the canal in the
enable two of the largest steamers to
pass each other in the canal with any
degree of safety. and would require
that one of them should tie up to the
bank while the other went by.
In order to avoid this delay i'm that
part of the canal, il has been thought
wise to Increase the bottom width from
300 to 300 feet in place and in material
that. of course, make the change most
expensive. So too in order that the
of steamers possible, the dimensions of
the six locks have been increased from
300 feet disable length by 20
feet width to 1000 feet disable
length and 40 feet width. This
was done at the instance of the
Navy Department on the ground that
they could look forward to the future and
see vessels of a beam exceeding 100 feet.
1t has also been found necessary to
change the channel of the canal on the
Pacific side from lake with a dam and
locks on the shore of the bay of Pana-
ma to sea level canal running four
miles inland. so as to remove the locks
four miles inward and beyond the pos
sible reach of the guns of an enemy in
Panama bay. These two changes also
have added very considerably to the cost
Again. IL has been found wise to en-
large the canal into a lake in the basin
at the foot of the Gatun locks. and what
ever variation in the plans which expert
ence in the construction has demon
strated the necessity for, the more than
doubling the cost of constructing and
engineering has been necessary. In adj
dition to this the cost OF sanitation and
government, without which the canal
could not have been built, will be about
S13.OO.UUO, and will carry the entire
cost of the canal to 1913, 100000.
Cut to Nearly $50, OOO, 900.