It opened in April, 1959. How did it affect railroad traffic patterns?
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
I live right next to it. You'd think I'd know.
Seems as though I've read that there was an effect. Perhaps not profound, but an effect nonetheless.
When you consider the basic premise of rail vs water (especially the Seaway), you've got rail capable of moving myriad products to multiple destinations - something ships don't do well.
On the other hand, if you're moving a significant quantity of a single commodity, water is hard to beat, if you can get there from here.
Consider how different the eastern coal railroads would be if you could get a salty all the way to VA/WV coal country.
The Seaway is actually pretty busy right now - as ships try to get in one last run before the Seaway closes up/freezes over in December.
We see a mix of lakers and salties here on the St Lawrence River.
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Duluth. Wheat. Europe.
It had a significant affect on certain product flows from Europe, inbound semi-finished steel, and outbound grain were significantly affected. It is quite common for Canadian Lakers to haul grain out the Seaway, and Iron Ore from Quebec back into the Great Lakes. Right now inbound flows are semi-finished steel, and Wind Turbine parts, plus certain "project" cargo like refinery parts, while outbound grain was up 123% in September over last year as a result of the Russian Grain embargo. This year so far 81 oceangoing vessels have visited the Great Lakes for the first time. If you are interested in the shipping on the Great Lakes here are two very good websites;
Boatnerd
Duluth Shipping News
There are several European shipping lines that specialize in service to the Great Lakes, Polsteam, BBC Chartering, Beluga Shipping.
In Canada there used to be a fair bit of Prairie grain that would keep switching modes. The big lakeboats could travel the upper Great Lakes freely, since the Soo lock was big. The Welland Canal, between Lakes Erie and Ontario, received rebuilding at various times, but was somewhat smaller. But prior to the St.Lawrence Seaway those old locks were quite small. Once the Seaway opened, the new locks could handle two of the old "canallers" with room to spare, and it was not long before the old boats disappeared.
Because of the limitations of the old canals, quite a lot of grain would travel to ports on the east side of Lake Huron where the big lakers would unload into large concrete elevators. From there it would again travel by rail to ports on the lower St.Lawrence navigable by the large sea-going bulk carriers, or even to the east coast. The Seaway allowed the large lakeboats to sail all the way to the lower ports and trans-ship directly through the grain terminals there. In general the marine bulk carriers still do not come up the Seaway.
Some rail movement for this eastern segment continued for a while, but the elevators on Lake Huron are pretty much all gone, and most of the connecting rail lines. But now the railways are starting to get a small level of revenge, and some grain is now being rail-hauled all the way east. Today's more efficient railway is able to compete in price, or at least come close, with the rather circuitous and time consuming shipping route through the lakes.
Someone else will have to comment on how the seaway affected merchandise shipments, especially with respect to US destinations.
John
The Ports of Duluth and Superior have been visited by 54 foreign (non- US or Canadian) vessels through the end of September. Non- Canadian exports totaled 1.7 million tons with 734,000 tons being Grain.
Two Polish freighters are currently in the ports to load Wheat, one at Cenex Harvest States and one at Peavey. A Greek freighter is due on Friday. General Mills has also been busy, and Duluth Storage (formerly Cargill) loaded its first ship in several years last month. Grains shipped by order of tonnage; Durum Wheat, Spring Wheat, Beet Pulp Pellets, Sorghum, Barley, Canola, and Flax Seed.
The seaway made it possible for the CP to abandon/sell its own line from Montreal to St John NB. The longer CN line was flatter but longer , it still survives. The old CP line is now split between the NBSR (New Bruswick Southern) and the MMA (Montreal Maine & Atlantic)
From a maritime perspective...I don't think the Seaway has really lived up to what was anticipated for it when it was built as the sized of ocean carriers has continued to grow and the new size ships are too large for the Seaway.
While it was mentioned that Duluth & Superior have seen 54 foreign flag vessels this year...at the time the Seaway was built the expections would have been for foreign vessels in the hundreds.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
The Seaway (roughly Montreal to Lake Ontario) was built to allow ocean freighters into the Great Lakes and to allow Lake boats to get to Montreal. The old locks were tiny, restricted to freighters of lengths of 250 feet. The Welland Canal already allowed lengths of 730 feet even prior to the building of the Seaway. The locks at the Soo are even bigger. At any rate, the Seaway never really lived up to its billing. At its peak in the 1960's, the Port of Chicago handled up to 500 ships per season. Volumes declined after that with the growth of containerization. About all you see now are bulk shipments.
Don't get me started. The Seaway and the Interstate Highway system as we know it were the results of the Eisenhower administration. By and large they syphoned off huge amounts of traffic from the railroads. The highway took a lot of freight but more passenger cars. But the Seaway closed or diminished the importance of many east coast ports. Thus there was a steep delcine in import/export traffic. The container hadn't evolved to the point as we know it. But it did take several decades for the ports to readapt to the changing patterns. If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream. What did the Seaway in in some respects is the same thing that helped the rebirth of Boston, NY, Philadelphia, Baltimore, etc. harbors: the ever increasing size of the container ship. In some ways the Seaway never lived up to its billed potential. Chicago was too far inland by water to become a super port and smaller ports like Oswego, NY and Erie, PA never got going. But when the Seaway opened there was a definite decline of rail freight traffic to and from these East Coast harbors.
Example: Friday night. DL&W from Hoboken. regular, advance and second sections of westbound freights began leaving @7P and before midnight included HB1, HB3,and HB5. Yes, maybe three sections of each about 60 to 100 cars long. After the Seaway, the EL combined westbound Friday nights were less than half that...which points to the patters of bankruptcies and mergers of the Eastern railroads in part effected by the Seaway.
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henry6 Don't get me started. ........................ If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream.
Don't get me started. ........................ If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream.
ICLand Duluth. Wheat. Europe.
Do you think that the March 29, 1957 bankruptcy approval of the liquidation of the entire New York Ontario & Western RR - which ran from Weehawken, NJ to Oswego, NY on Lake Ontario - as the first abandonment of a major railroad up to that time, was one of the earliest railroad casualties of the improved Seaway ? Or was that in response to other economic forces, as it happened before the Seaway was completely finished and opened ?
- Paul North.
Murphy Siding henry6: Don't get me started. ........................ If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream. OK I won't get you started, but.....are sure the seaway took away enough shipping from NYC to eliminate thousands of piers?
henry6: Don't get me started. ........................ If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream.
OK I won't get you started, but.....are sure the seaway took away enough shipping from NYC to eliminate thousands of piers?
Don't know about how much RR traffic was lost to the Seaway but I do know that it has turned into one of the largest conduits for invasive species into the US via contaminated ballast water from foreign ships.
The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel did a very indepth study showing the Seaway only cotributes $55 million a year from foreign trade consisting of mostly incoming steel products and outgoing grain but that the cost of dealing with invasive species runs into the billions. The paper figured that 3 or 4 trains daily during the shipping season would take care of this traffic. It would take only 2 to 3 trains per day averaged out over the whole year to accomodate this traffic.
I'm not a tree hugger but even I see the fallacy of still keeping the Seaway open. Shut it down and put the freight back on rails where it belongs.
Pat.
Don't see how the Seaway could have had any effect on the NYO&W failure....it had been failing for a long time before they threw in the towel.
Paul_D_North_Jr Do you think that the March 29, 1957 bankruptcy approval of the liquidation of the entire New York Ontario & Western RR - which ran from Weehawken, NJ to Oswego, NY on Lake Ontario - as the first abandonment of a major railroad up to that time, was one of the earliest railroad casualties of the improved Seaway ? Or was that in response to other economic forces, as it happened before the Seaway was completely finished and opened ? - Paul North.
Alright, I never counted the piers...but look at the pictures: the piers were spaced 50 to 100 feet apart from the tip of Manhatten altmost to Columbia U.; all of Brooklyn facing the East RIver all the way to Astoria; up the Jersey shoreline from Perth Amboy to the GWBridge. Some were with short slips, others several hundred feet.
Harbor traffic did fall with the opening of the Seaway, that's for sure, and thus rail traffic correspondingly declined. As for the Seaway's effect on the NYO&W, really: the Old Woman was gone in '57 and the Seaway wasn't fully opened until '59. She was a wander from here to there with noplace in between. Trucks took the milk traffic, fuel oil doused the Anthracite. All her neighbors made better connections with the New Haven at Maybrook to the west and south except for the NYC which had its own route from New England and New York. State highway 17 killed the passenger service (for the Erie,too, but less so as the Erie went through denser populated areas). No,if she didn't jump from hill top to hill top she bore through it and slid down into the valley and grappled with the climb on the other side.
But there was a lot of bulk traffic that the Seaway picked up that no longer went through many East coast ports...NY wasn't the only one.
henry6 Don't get me started. The Seaway and the Interstate Highway system as we know it were the results of the Eisenhower administration. By and large they syphoned off huge amounts of traffic from the railroads. The highway took a lot of freight but more passenger cars. But the Seaway closed or diminished the importance of many east coast ports. Thus there was a steep delcine in import/export traffic. The container hadn't evolved to the point as we know it. But it did take several decades for the ports to readapt to the changing patterns. If you look at pictures of the Hudson/North River from as late as the 50's you'll see thousands of piers jutting out into the stream. What did the Seaway in in some respects is the same thing that helped the rebirth of Boston, NY, Philadelphia, Baltimore, etc. harbors: the ever increasing size of the container ship. In some ways the Seaway never lived up to its billed potential. Chicago was too far inland by water to become a super port and smaller ports like Oswego, NY and Erie, PA never got going. But when the Seaway opened there was a definite decline of rail freight traffic to and from these East Coast harbors.
Henry6, if you are as interested in shipping as it appears that you are I think you will find the book "The Box" by Marc Levinson very interesting. He goes into great detail about the Docks of Manhattan and Brooklyn.
The Box
Murphy Siding ICLand: Duluth. Wheat. Europe. Was the wheat all going by rail to the east coast, then to Europe before the seaway was opened?
ICLand: Duluth. Wheat. Europe.
Was the wheat all going by rail to the east coast, then to Europe before the seaway was opened?
The lower transportation cost of wheat through Duluth rather than over railroads east of Chicago had made Midwest wheat competitive on world markets even before the Seaway, and even though grain was generally offloaded at Buffalo or other locations, then rail shipped to New York for transoceanic shipment. The Erie Canal was part of the history of the marketing of Midwest wheat. That "system" -- Duluth, Lakes, Buffalo, New York, Europe -- was the basis for the success of the Granger Roads and is how Cargill got its start.
The Seaway, by lowering the overall costs of shipping even more, made the economic area for growing wheat in the Midwest substantially larger.
beaulieu Henry6, if you are as interested in shipping as it appears that you are I think you will find the book "The Box" by Marc Levinson very interesting. He goes into great detail about the Docks of Manhattan and Brooklyn. The Box
Thanks...will seek it out next trip to the library.
It had a major effect on the Grand Trunk Eastern line between Montreal and Portland, ME. This line was a big factor in moving Canadian grain, particularly during the winter, for shipment to Europe. Portland had the advantage of being an ice free port within 200 miles of Montreal. Now Portland handles few exports with its port almost exclusively utilized for incoming petroleum products for shipment by pipeline to Montreal. The old Grand Trunk is stll in operation as the St. Lawrence and Atlantic RR as a subsidiary of Genessee and Wyoming but It now longer terminates in Lewiston, ME.
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