Saint Lawrence Seaway

The St. Lawrence Seaway (French: Voie Maritime du Saint -Laurent, English: Saint Lawrence Seaway ) is a in the years 1951-1959 developed between Lake Ontario and Montreal waterway that is equipped with numerous canals and locks and their depth it also allows ocean-going vessels up to Seawaymaxklasse, from the Atlantic Ocean to drive the St. Lawrence Gulf, up to 3700 km in the interior of North America. It is situated in the territory of Canada and the United States.

Since the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway is continuous at least 8.23 meters, in some places up to 9 feet deep. Until 1903 they had already brought the already existing channels to a depth of 4.32 meters.

• 4.1 Ports

General

The Saint Lawrence River reaches a length of 1223 kilometers. Its origin lies at the eastern end of Lake Ontario, the smallest of the Great Lakes. The entire river system, which includes the Great Lakes (including the source of the Saint Louis River in Minnesota) is 3219 km long, the established sea itself measures only 293 km. He is repeatedly interrupted by the Great Lakes. So he goes through the Lake Superior, Lake Huron, Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, as well as hundreds of other small tributary lakes such as the Iroquois Dam. The St. Lawrence River is one of the busiest waterways in the world, although it can be driven because of the thick layers of ice from April to December. Overall, he overcomes 184 meters difference in altitude. The Niagara Falls are bypassed with a staircase of eight locks that overcome at a length of 42 kilometers nearly 100 meters. This channel carries the name Welland Canal. It is used annually by more than 1,700 ships.

Background

Mass freight

The bulk freight end of the 19th century in North America called for new affordable transport routes that could be provided by the new transcontinental railroad lines. At the same time, work began on the expansion of sea routes. Although there were earlier channels between the Great Lakes. But they were not deep enough for the new mass freight transport, so that the United States and Canada wanted to open by expansion works and a new sea route, which should compete with the railways.

Competing transport routes

The providers of transport services using alternative ways feared economic losses. The losses in the following first-mentioned result from a free market distortion by the state, the other by the new legitimate competition.

The private eastern railway companies of the United States criticized the use of public funds for the construction of the St. Lawrence seaway. This unequal treatment would restrict free competition. A financial state funding of the railways they still refused, because they were against nationalization. At the St. Lawrence Seaway and hydroelectric power plants should be built so that the railway companies foresaw the elimination of mass transport of coal to the northeastern thermal power plants. The Atlantic seaports were afraid of the St. Lawrence Seaway. They feared a break of about shipping. In fact, the St. Lawrence Seaway was later used mainly for domestic traffic. In addition, the southern ports had to worry about transport losses on the Gulf of Mexico. Instead of the Mississippi River to the southern ports the grain exports should be routed from the Midwest about the new St. Lawrence Seaway in the world. However, after completion of the sea route was noticed at these ports is hardly a loss of about shipping.

Construction and Facts

The Saint Lawrence Seaway Authority Act was given permission for the construction of the sea route in Washington Canada in 1951 because the United States had not yet decided to participate in the construction. 1954 " St. Lawerence Seaway Development Corporation "was established, so that in the same year, the joint construction could begin. In 1959, the St. Lawrence Seaway was completed. The waterway was partially out of the area of existing settlements. The settlements were partially removed and can be seen at Upper Canada Village.

On the construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway average 22,000 people were involved. The entire building cost a total of around 470 million U.S. dollars. Of this sum, Canada took over rounded 336 million U.S. dollars. The remaining sum of rounded up 134 million U.S. dollars brought to the United States. The building included the construction of canals, locks, dams, bridges and power plants. The supervision took over in Canada, the Saint Lawrence Seaway Authority and the U.S. Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation.

Economy

Only 10 percent of seagoing vessels could sail the sea because of the size restrictions. From the expansion of the sea route benefited many ports as they have been equipped with new facilities and transport links. In the U.S., these include Chicago, Gary, Detroit and Duluth. On the Canadian side, there are Toronto, Hamilton and Thunder Bay. Montreal has developed through the St. Lawrence Seaway to one of the most important container ports. There, now more than 52 percent of the container cargo in the country are handled. By sea are mainly agricultural products, but also transports iron ore and finished products. Overall, the cargo carried trade goods amounted in 2004 to 43 million tons.

Within the Great Lakes operate so-called Lakers, ships that can load about 25,000 tonnes and can only operate above the Wellandkanals.

The ports

Most ports in the St. Lawrence seaway and the Great Lakes are on the side of the USA. Especially in the immediate period after the expansion to the St. Lawrence Seaway ports were the bottleneck of the rapidly increasing ship traffic. The port operators were just using to monitor developments before they invested. Therefore, the regional authorities felt obliged to finance the expansion of the port itself. The new ports required a greater water depth, new terminals and storage facilities.

Usability in winter

The sea route is passable these days from late March to late December. Of these 25 days only possible through the use of new techniques that keep the canals and locks free of ice. Plans, which provided for the use of icebreakers and heated locks to keep the sea all year round usable, were not realized. To date, the sea from the sea by icebreaker is only to Montreal passable.

Automatic Identification System

The world's first automatic identification system (AIS ) in 2003 was used on the St. Lawrence Seaway. This radio system is used to exchange information such as ship navigation data and aims to facilitate the safe steering of ships.