Show AN IMNENSE UNDERTAKING Proposed Ship Canal From Great Lakes to Atlantic Ocean Albany N Y July 26Engineer George W Rafter in charge of the survey for the orooosed ship canal from the great lakes to the AtlantIc ocean has completed his prelimInary work and drawn his report The project is to cut a canal thIrty feet deep and 140 feet wIde which is three and one third the depth and five times the width of the Erie canal front Lake Erie to Lake Ontario around Niagara Falls leaving Lake Ontario at Oswego river through Oswego river to Oneida lake thence through the Mohawk val hey to the Hudson river A single lock will be 1000 feet long and will be ovei fifty feet high The greatest problem has been to find storage for water to feed this great canal on its various levels and yet not affect the water supplyof manufacturing concerns now using various rivers Mr Rafter plans a great dam at Carthage on the Black river in Jefferson county making a lake covering eighty square miles of land to feed the canal From this reservoir Mr Rafter has located a canal nine miles long as wide as the Erie to the proposed ship canal just west of Rome and on the way down has planned a secondary reservoir reser-voir in the Salmon river The commis abas work also includes a similar survey for a canal of the same character char-acter leaving the St Lawrence river at the head of the Coteau rapids and thence Into and through Lake Champlain Cham-plain |