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Show IlrlnKlng Ice to Town. Seven hundred thousand tons of ice are stacked on tho shores of Lake Champlain and Lake George. Tho ice harvesters had expected to ship most of this by boat to the city storehouses and depots at tho opening of navigation. The regular ice barges will not lock through tha Cham-plain Cham-plain canal, so here is the difficulty. A fair average of 17 tons per car would require re-quire 750 trains of 40 cars each, and if six such trains could bo loaded and sent per day, which, with the single track road, is doubtful, it would require 125 days or steady woru. On the other hand, if water transportation transpor-tation is chosen on account of lower rates, at lf0 tons per canal boat, it would require 8,800 canal boats to bring it to tide water. Last year, which was exceptionally ex-ceptionally good for boating, only 2,000 boats were cleared from the Whitehall office south. The boatmen propose to take advantage of the necessities of shippers, and will largely increase thoir rates. Thoy are demanding $8 per day for the use of then hoata. Many of the ice companies have brought their barges up the Hudson and propose to transfer the ice from the canal boats to tho barges, many of which hold 1,1200 tons, thus saving some time in the use of the canal boats, but causing considerable con-siderable loss of ice through waste in handling so many times. It is estimated that Essex county is some $300,000 wealthier through the ice bonanza this winter. Now York Press. |