Evening star., 1923-02-24
NICARAGUA ROUTE
HAS GOOD OUTLOOK
Inland Waters Would Be
Great Aid to Digging OF
Big New Canal.
RICH COUNTRY INVOLVED
Forests of Hard and Soft Woods
and Coffee and Cacao Fields
Would Be Opened
RICH COUNTRY INVOLVED

Whether a Nicaraguan canal will be
built is a question which only the
future can answer. but it has been
so continuously discussed and It's
possible site so thoroughly surveyed
that the term "Nicaraguan canal
route" is easily described. This route,
in which interest has been re-
awakened by the recent signing of
protocol between the United States
and Costa Rica, relating to the pro-
posed canal. is the subjectsof the fol-
lowing bulletin from the Washing
ton headquarters of the National Geo
graphic Society:
THE Panama canal. If one leaves its
locks and small artificial lake out OF
consideration. may be considered the
American SueZ; for il is relatively
short and direct" says the bulletin
The Nicaragua route-again ignor-
ing lockS-muSt be compaTed with the
Turkish straits; ii is relatively long.
and has in its course great natural
inland sea from which narrow ship
ways are projected.
Utilizing One of Lakes
"A Nicaraguan canal would be less
n man-made affair than the Panama
canal. where at every turn nature
had to be thwarted and subdued by
engineers There ships now move
every foot of the interocean way
through great bitches that were dug,
locks that were built, or lake that
was created by men. The Chagres
river was turned aside TO make
lake and even its bed was discarded
If a Nicaraguan canal We're built
according to existing plans Il would
entail much excavation and lock
building. but work that nature has
already done would be utilized to
marked degree.
: From the Atlantic end a canal
would have to be excavated, largely
through lowlands, for some fifty
miles, for the lower reaches Of the
San Juan river are clogged with
sand brought down from the uplands
of Costa Rica. Locks would then
level of the lake. Ships would be
transferred into the San Juan river.
damned at this point, and would
move up its slack water for approx
imately forty-fve miles to Lake
Nicaragua. This lake is a really
large body of watcr-one of Amer
ica'S great lakes'-though far from
it's peers. 1t is 100 miles long and
forty-hve miles wide at the broadest
point, and is the most extensive body
south OF Lake Michigan. For seventy
miles ships would use the waters or
Lake Nicaragua. Then would come
the descent to the Pacific through a
canal and locks covering the dozen
miles or more OF narrow isthmus
that divides the lake from the ocean.
Pacific Part Easy.
The river and lake portion of the
route above the dam, however would
not all be in readiness for use with
out the expenditure of labor OF the
forty,hve miles of river twenty-eight
would require improvement, while a
channel would have to be dredeed
through score of miles of the lake
near the river outlet where silt has
accumulated.
THE Pacific side Of the canal would
present relatively few difficulties. The
narrow divide at the point crossed by
the canal route rises only forty-four
feet above the lake level
"Altogether the canal route, from
deep water to deep water would he
ABOUT $50 miles long. The passage of
ships would require more than
tWenty-four hours as against twelve
or less at Panama. Such a canal could
be reached, on the other hand. more
quickly from ports of the United
States.
"One other contrast exists between
the Panama canal and the Nicaraeuan
route. The former trayerses country
of relatively limited potential wealth.
A canal through Nicaragua would
doubtless be strong factor in the
development of that country, opening
up It's vast forests of both hard and
soft woods and tapping its coffee and
cacao plantations and its mines. Lake
Nicaragua is already an important
inland waterway, and near it's banks
are some of the chief cities of the re-
public"