The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-04-27

require no longer to ship Dy riVer than by rail.
 ! Reliability Necessary
 The fundamental requisite for sue. cess on any waterway is reliability Of service. There is no place in the or ganization of modern business for the lackidasical, happy -go-lucky packet boat service, obligingly tying up at any old tree to land an empty chicken coop, but as uncertain in it's goings and comlngs as the sunshine, of an April day. The modern river barge line operates on schedule and stops only at definite points where terminal or transfer Ia cilities exist.
 In the past the improvement of our rivers has not been such as to encourage private capital to invest heavily in .ex- pensive modern equipment. Open chan nel work has been the rule and the deepened channels have caused increased velocity of the current so that the sides and bottom of the channel have been secured and the material carried down-stream and deposited in bars. which have been, continual causes of difficulty in navigation. Far more sat isfactory than open channels are the slack-water pools, formed by dams, and in recent years canalizati0n of our rivers by locks and dams has been largely taking the place of open chan mel work at lateral canals.
 ,y On the Ohio river and tributaries above the mouth of the Cumberland river, for example, the government has spent about $150, 100000 in it's work of improvement. The present project, adopted after nearly 100 years of eff fort to maintain an7open channel, was authorized in 1910 aud colsists of 54 locks and movable lHms between Pitts burg and Cairo, III. At present 38 dams have been built, seven are under construction, and nine have not yet been started. It is expected that the entire work will be completed in about five years. The Ohio river will then have a minimum depth from Pittsburg to Cairo of nine feet, and the locks are uniformly GOO feet long by no feet wide-the width sbeing the same as the locks in the Panama Canal. E When the features of the Ohio river and the Tennessee river are compared, 1t becomes immediately evident that the nine-foot channel which has been adopted for the Ohio river is practi- cable for the Tennessee river also, and in fact even 12-foot depth is we'll within the bounds of consideration.
 The facts concerning these two rivers were brought out admirably by the late Senator John T. Morgan in bis re- markable report entitled, Navigation of Tennessee River" published on De- cember 1S, '1905. The summary of facts and conclusions developed by study of the Tennessee river on the part of select committee of the Senate re- quires but little change or modifica- tion today although we have the bene- fit of an increased knowledge of these facts accumulated over period of some 20 years since his report was is- sued.
 The report calls attention to the striking similarity of the two rivers, and emphasizes the fact that these two streams are practically identical in vol ume at Paducah where they unite, while for the same stage of water the volume of the Ohio at Pittsburg is only about half as great as that of the Tennessee at Knoxville.
 "A boat loaded with commerce at Pittsburg and destined to Knoxville" :" says the report, 1has as much right to the convenient navigation of the Tennessee river as it would have on the Mississippi river if it was destined to New Orleans"
 In spite of this seIf-evident fact the size of the locks on the Ohio river are uniformly 110x600 feet, while the locks of the great Wilson Dam on the Ten nesSee river are only 60x300.
 Lock Dimensions
 The dimensions of the locks in the Tennessee river are as follows:
 PRESENT LOCKS