OTI'S CO

Skaneateles, N.Y.

The Erie Canal is an historic canal in upstate New York that runs east to west between the Hudson River and Lake Erie.  Completed in 1825, the canal was the first navigable waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes vastly reducing the costs of transporting people and goods across the Applachians.  In effect, the canal accelerated the settlement of the Great Lakes region, the westward expansion of the United States and the economic rise of New York State.  It has been called "The Nation's First Superhighway".

The length of the canal is 363 miles and is 571 feet above sea level.  The principal engineer was Benjamin Wright. The New York State Legislature authorized construction on July 4, 1817 at Rome, New York. The canal opened on October 26, 1825. The start point is at the Hudson River near Albany, New York and the end point if Niagara River near Buffalo, New York.  Branches are the Oswego Canal to Lake Ontario and the Cayuga-Seneca Canal to Cayuga Lake and Seneca Lake.  The Erie Canal connects to the Champlain Canal to Lake Champlain and the Welland Canal to Lake Ontario.

A canal from the Hudson River to the Great Lakes was first proposed in the 1780s, but a formal survey was not conducted until 1808.  The New York State Legislature authorized construction in 1817.  The westward connection gave New York City a strong advantage over all other U.S. posts and brought major growth to canal cities such as Albany, Utica, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo.  

The construction of the Erie Canal was a landmark civil engineering achievement in the early history of the United States.  When built, the canal was the second-longest in the world (after the Grand Canal in China). The canal has 34 locks, including the Waterford Flight, the steepest locks in the United States.  When leaving the canal, boats must also traverse the Black Rock Lock to reach Lake Erie or the Troy Federal Lock to reach the tidal Hudson.  The overall elevation difference is about 565 feet.  

The Erie Canal's peak year was 1855, when 33,000 commercial shipments took place.  It continues to be competitive with railroads until about 1902 when tolls were abolished.  Commercial traffic declined heavily in the latter half of the 20th century due to competition from trucking and the 1959 opening of the larger St. Lawrence Seaway.  The canal's last regularly scheduled hauler, the Day Peckinpaugh, ended service in 1994.  

Today, the Erie Canal is mainly used by recreational watercraft from May through November each year. 

 This photo features a highway tunnel that goes underneath the canal.

During winter, water is drained from parts of the canal for maintenance.  The canal has also become a tourist attractions in its own right and a number of parks/museums are dedicated to its history.  The New York State Canalway Trail is a popular cycling path that follows the canal across the state.  In 2000, Congress designated the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor to protect and promote the system.  

There are several locks on the Erie Canal. Locks are elevators for boats, lifting and lowering them as they travel along the waterway.  It takes about 15 minutes to "lock through".  There are 57 locks on New York's canal system, including 35 on the Erie Canal though originally 83 locks then the number was reduced to 72 locks, 11 on the Champlain Canal, 7 on the Oswego Canal and 4 on the Cayuga-Seneca Canal. In the early days of the canal, when horses and mules walked the towpath, this is how a canal boat passed through a lock.  Today,  boat owners are required to follow certain rules to "lock through".  The official New York Sstate Canal System website has a page on Navigating the Canals.  The original Erie Canal locks were 90 feet long and 15 feet wide.  They were designed for a canal boat 61 feet long and 7 feet wide with a 3 1/2 foot draft. In order to keep pace with the increasing traffic on the canal, it was enlarged between 1836 and 1862.  The size of the locks was increased to 110 feet long and 18 feet wide.  The depth of the Erie Canal, today is 12-23 feet and it took 8 years to dig the 360-mile canal through thick forests and stubborn rock!  An engineering marvel, unlike anything America had ever seen.  The man-made waterway included a final "flight" of interconnected locks to raise boats over the 70-foot Niagara Escarpment. Escarpment:  a long, steep slope, especially one at the edge of a plateau or separating areas of land at different heights.  

Tugboat at Lock E33 in Rochester, New York

The Erie Canal is a destination for tourists from around the world and has inspired guidebooks dedicated to exploration of the waterway.  An Erie Canal Cruise Company, based in Herekimer, New York located southeast of Utica, operates from mid-May until mid-October with daily cruises.

Aside from transportation, numerous businesses, farms, factories and communities alongside its banks still utilize the canal's waters for other purposes such as irrigation for farmland.  Use of the canal system has an estimated total economic impart of $6.2 billion, annually.