Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Frustration fed by lack of communication –

Approximately 2 weeks ago, it started raining in New York.  Approximately 10 days ago, and for the last several days, we have been trapped in the Erie Canal due to flooding.  This scenario apparently continues to replay itself over and over, during the last few years.  It seems to me rather incredible that a canal that was built and has been operating since the 1850’s is incapable of handling rain.  I realize it’s a lot of rain, but rumor has it, there is something deeper going on.  Small bits of evidence have been floating to the surface in support of the proposition that this canal system is broken, and I do not mean the dams.  First, a little background.

By the middle of the 19th century, westward settlement was only beginning.  There were few reasons for folks to move “out there” to lands where they faced little in the way of comfort, little in the way of promise, and little in the way of hope.  As far as New York State was concerned there was no easy or inexpensive way to move products from the west to a market.  Think about it.  If you’re a farmer in 1850, you cannot work that far from the market less your goods spoil before they even get there.  Moreover, the further west you moved, the more difficult it would be to obtain goods and supplies to build communities.  Long before modern highways, and long before vast webs of railroads were developed in this country, Americans looked to the water to move goods from here to there.  In fact, well before the Revolutionary War, and before he became a military man, George Washington was a surveyor and engineer touted as the “father of American canals.

Former New York Governor Dewitt Clinton was called a “visionary dreamer” when he wrote down his dream about the original Erie Canal.  However, no words can more ably describe what the Erie Canal would do, and has done, for the State of New York, and particularly, New York City:

“As a bond of union between the Atlantic and western states, it may prevent the dismemberment of the American Empire.  As an organ of communication between the Hudson, the Mississippi, the St. Lawrence, the Great Lakes of the north and west and their tributary rivers, it will create the greatest inland trade ever witnessed.  The most fertile and extensive regions of America will vail themselves of the facilities for a market.  All the surplus productions, whether of the soil, the forest, the mines, or the water, their fabrics of art and their supplies of foreign commodities, will concentrate in the city of New York, for transportation abroad or consumption at home.  Agriculture, manufacturers, commerce, trade, navigation, and the arts will receive a correspondent encouragement.  The city will, in the course of time, become the granary of the world, the emporium of commerce, the seat of manufactures, the focus of great moneyed operations and the concentrating point of vast, disposable , and accumulating capitals, which will stimulate, enliven, extend, and reward the exertions of human labor and ingenuity, in all their processes and exhibitions.  And before the revolution of a century, the whole island of Manhattan, covered with inhabitants and replenished with a dense population , will constitute one vast city.”

It is not surprising that there were doubters among those who dreamed.  As a result, the construction of the Erie Canal was delayed for many years.  The perceived difficulties prevented many a private developer from attempting to get involved.  So, and finally, in 1817, the state of New York actually undertook the canal project and began construction.  Back then, it was referred to as “Clinton’s big ditch.”

The Erie Canal opened in 1825.  It doesn’t look at all like the canal we travel on today.  It was only 4 feet deep and 40 feet wide and could accommodate loads up to 30 tons.  However, over many years, the canal was modified to accommodate larger and larger loads, and incorporated various tributary canals.  Here are a couple of facts describing the current canal profile:

               1.            The barge canal consists of the Erie Canal – 340.7 miles (from Troy on the Hudson River to Tonawanda on the Niagara River); the Champlain Canal – 62.6 miles (from Troy on the Hudson River to Lake Champlain); the Oswego Canal – 23.8 miles (from Three Rivers Point near Syracuse to Lake Ontario); Cayuga and Seneca Canals – 27.1 miles (connecting Cayuga and Seneca Lakes with the Erie Canal); and 347.1 miles of connecting rivers and lakes, for a total of 801.3 miles of waterway.

               2.            There are a total of 57 locks in the system.  These locks are concrete and operate by electricity, their lifts ranging from 6 to 40.5 feet.

               3.            As an economic development project, it certainly succeeded:  the original Erie Canal construction began in 1817 and was completed in 1825.  Tolls were abolished in 1882.  In other words, the canal paid for itself in a relatively short period of time.

               4.            The barge canal system should be considered one of the engineering wonders of the world.  It is ten times longer and has many more structures than the Panama Canal, some of which are noteworthy worldwide. 

Governor Clinton’s dream blossomed.  Settlers flocked west.  Forests turned into saleable lumber, towns were constructed and populations grew steadily along the canal and on the Great Lakes.  Moreover, New York City emerged from the shadows of Philadelphia and Boston and became the nation’s greatest sea port and one of the world’s most dynamic cities.  The success of the Erie Canal has been described as “a veritable frenzy.”  It was so successful, that, over the years, it had to be enlarged on several occasions.  In 1825 when the barge canal opened, a large barge was 30 tons.  At its height, barges capable of carrying 650 tons were in use.  It is noteworthy to understand that the powers that be determined it was more feasible to design and build the canals and their improvements to accommodate barges, rather than ocean capable ships given the vagaries of design and construction.  The barges could be developed with more uniformity.  Barges therefore carried goods to New York City where they delivered the goods to terminals where said goods were then loaded onto ships for transportation to the far reaches of the globe.

Today, the New York Canals are no longer “barge canals.”  The movement of goods and materials has been assumed by trains and trucks.  Now, pleasure boats and tour operators operate on the canal system.  It’s a tourist destination and many of the important commercial installations have been relegated to the status of historic restoration sites.  All along the canals the once booming factories are silent, and economic destitution is a common theme.  The towns that sprung up along the canal are largely, and with few exceptions, economic wastelands.  This notwithstanding, in 1992, New York enacted legislation to change the name of the Barge Canal to the New York State Canal System.  It was operated by the New York Canal Corporation as an independent entity.  Recently, however, and due to economic considerations, “ownership” of the canal system was turned over to the New York State Thruway Authority (the Highway Department).  In my opinion, this was a big mistake.  This is tantamount to turning over control of the national parks to the national highway administration.  It would appear that the canal system became an afterthought. 
Over the last couple years, there have been mass layoffs.  Canal folks complain that the administrators haven’t the slightest idea of what’s important in terms of maintaining the canal system.  I heard one canal worker mock the director of the Throughway Authority who was quoted as proclaiming that all he knew about locks was that the boat goes in, water comes in, and the boat goes out.  Several lock workers complain that they are now vastly understaffed to deal with conditions that come up due to bad weather.  The lock operation hours have been cut, but the user fees remained the same.  The authority has been fragmented into various sections and no section knows necessarily what the section above or below it is doing.  The union workers are pissed off at the management administration and there has been a serious decline in morale and pride.  The canal we transited in 2011 is not the same canal system we are experiencing now.

So, we have had some bad weather over the past few weeks.  There have been tropical storms and hurricanes over the last couple years.  So I have to ask myself, how it is that the New York Canal System has brought so much success to the state for so many years, but only in the last few years has it genuinely began to suffer?  To me, it seems pretty clear.  Whereas the canals were the epitome of a successful government operation,  it was, after all, a state project from the very beginning, it has become the “ugly sister” that the parents are ashamed of.  It is now a prime example of all the bad things about a "government operation."  The New York Throughway Authority doesn’t know what it is doing and guess what happens:  recreational boaters, the only boaters that use the canal system, get stuck because the Authority cannot manage the waterways they do not understand or know anything about.  I feel certain that, if it was up to them, they’d close the canals proclaiming a loss of revenue as the reason.

As far as recreational boats are concerned, the biggest problem is the lack of communication.  News of closures and reopenings has been scarce and generally not up to date.  There are boaters stuck in locks and literally at the mercy of the Authority.  The canal workers have been generally wonderful in that they bring these boaters what they need – electricity, water, and sanitation removal.  In that regard, I do want to recite a recent anecdote.

There were three of us  cruising boats delayed just west of lock 16 for several days due to lock closures above and below us on the system.  The Authority did nothing.  They did nothing about bringing water, and nothing about bringing power.  There is a guy who lives nearby named Marcel, and another guy who came all the way up from Canajoharie named Dave, who pulled things together for all the rest of us.  Marcel gathered up power cords from God knows where, and with splitters galore, managed to get power to almost every boat stuck on that damned wall from a single 50 amp outlet.  Dave drove many miles out of his way to take several of us at a time to the grocery store.  Other local folks let some of us use their cars.  Many other locals stopped by just to say "Hi" and let us know that they would be around if we needed anything at all.  But where was the Throughway Authority?

Yesterday, we boaters started making noise about fresh water.  A day or so prior, the lock operator’s response was that we could go to the store and get some bottles.  Wrong answer.  Really?  Oh yeah, we should all just take a 12 mile stroll to the nearest market and carry back all those bottles of water required to fill our boat tanks?  Dumbass!  Moreover, the water at the lock building was labled non-potable.

We started making noise about needing waste removal (a pump out).  The same operator’s response was that he would leave the door to his personal “shitter” unlocked.  Wrong answer again.  I explained to him yesterday that his proposal was misled insofar as there is one boat with 4 people on it who are in their 70’s who, due to the falling water levels in the land cut, would be expected to climb a ladder out of their boat and then walk 250 yards, at night, in the dark, on a wet sloping grassy hill to use the toilet.  I looked him in the eye and asked him how badly he wanted to get sued?  His glassy eyed, deer-in-the headlights expression said it all – he did not give a rat’s ass.  It wasn’t his problem, or his job to worry about it.  He was just not getting the message about the fact that these boats are our homes for the duration.  He had no respect for this fact and probably resents the fact that there are folks out there who do this and he can't.

So, that’s when all three boats started making phone calls to all those supervisors who showed up to glad-hand and hand out business cards as the water levels were burying docks.  One of us even got the Mayor of nearby St. Johnsville on the phone.  Within an hour, a water tank truck showed up, and rumor had it, either a pump out would be on the way, or they would open the prior lock to let those that needed to, get to the closest marina for pump outs.

Moreover, “the suits” (directors and executive directors) actually showed up and somehow magically got locks 17 and up operational so we could leave, and we got some real information about the status of things up and down the canal.  Of course, then they also updated their website insofar as we complained most about the lack of communication.  We have been assured that we would not have to pay for extra days on our canal passes.  We’ll have to see how that pans out insofar as the operation is about as efficient these days as a one-armed wall paper hanger.

Thus, suffice it to say that I am not real pleased with the NY Canal System this time through.  It’s not so much the incessant delays and the feeling that New York won’t let me leave, as it is the seeming apathy of those responsible for keeping this invaluable resource open and operating.  This whole mess started because some person with very little common sense determined that it would be a good idea to unload the dams upstream before making it possible to drain off the coming flash flood downstream.  So, they blew up their own operation.  This mess has nothing to do with large amounts of rainfall.  It has everything to do with the ineptitude of those horses asses in Albany who might know something about trash removal on the highways, but know nothing of how to manage a multilevel canal system.   I encourage all my cruising friends who are stuck in the locks below us to start making as much noise as you can.  It seems the idea of bad publicity sparks action amongst these otherwise apathetic government beaurocrats.

I’m very concerned that all this talk about a strong commitment to preserve the rich history and heritage of the canal is a lot of window dressing  The first thing they need to do is get it out of the hands of the highway department and put it back where it belongs – with the New York State Canal Corporation.  And, while they’re at it, they should spray for mosquitos.  My feet are getting chewed. 
We plan to make it to Sylvan Beach today at the edge of Lake Oneida, so close to the Oswego Canal and Lake Ontario we can smell it.  We can cross to Brewerton and wait for locks 23-25 and the Oswego Canal to open, but there is more to do in Sylvan Beach.  So, if you have to be stuck....again.....it might as well be in a place that offers a modecum of entertainment opportunities.  I want ice cream.
 

No comments:

Post a Comment