Canal Dreams

Hubris in the PNW

Beginning with the 363-mile Erie Canal in 1825, Americans unzippered the landscape, building more than 2,600 miles of canals in the next decade. This Canal Era, as some label it, was in its prime up until the Civil War when water travel gave way to railroads. Not to be left out, the ambitious settlers of Washington cottoned on to the craze. On July 4, 1854, Thomas Mercer proposed his grand linkage of Lake Washington and Puget Sound, which ultimately led 63 years later to Seattle’s modern ship canal and locks.

Settlers south of Seattle had an even grander vision. In 1860, former territorial governor Isaac Stevens wrote: “The country between the Columbia River and Puget Sound . . . was so favorable that it had been an idea, presented years earlier, to connect their waters by a canal.” South Sounders agreed wholeheartedly and for the next century advocated for connecting the region’s two great bodies of local water. Few were as outspoken as an engineer named Elias Payn, who urged construction because “the law of necessity and circumstances of maritime navigation” dictated such a formidable project.

Prompted in part by Mr. Payn’s enthusiasm, the Seattle P-I published an article describing the canal system. It would run from near Olympia to the Black River to the Chehalis River and out to Grays Harbor, along with a canal linking Grays Harbor to the Columbia River.

Fourteen years later the Washington state legislature created a commission tasked with completing Payn’s vision. The 1933 plan called for a 44-mile canal from Olympia to Aberdeen, an 11-mile canal connecting Grays Harbor and Willapa Bay, and a final 5-mile canal linking the bay to the Columbia River. Total excavation: 48 to 568 million cubic yards of sediment, depending on width and depth. (The Panama Canal required the excavation of more than 300 million cu. yds.) Total cost: $44 million ($6 to $16 billion in 2020). Total employment: 20,000 for two years. In 1961, the legislature tried again to revive the idea but succeeded about as well as their predecessors. 

Given the era, it’s not surprising that the Olympia to Columbia River Canal was not the lone idea to “fix” the landscape to meet human needs. In 1894, Capt. Thomas Symons of the Army Corps of Engineers examined the feasibility of connecting Hood Canal with the south end of Puget Sound. Because of the proximity of the waterways, the “project has been many times mentioned,” wrote Symons. 

The 40-foot-wide, 26-foot-deep, 2-mile canal would require moving more than 51,000,000 cubic yards of rock and soil. (Total excavation for the Denny Regrades was 11,000,000 cu. yds. and for the Lake Washington Ship Canal about 5,100,000 cu. yds.) Crushing the hopes of supporters, Symons concluded: “I beg to again submit the opinion that the slight advantages derived from the proposed waterway and channel…render the improvement unworthy…”

Generated decades after the more developed and older parts of the country had moved to rail, these local canal projects are a mix of hubris, belief in humanity’s dominion over nature, and ambitious dreams of saving time. They were also unnecessary. Transcontinental rail reached Puget Sound in the 1890s and tracks soon were snaking across the region. By 1919, automobile use was starting to soar and we no longer were relying on steamships as the preferred mode of moving goods and people.

One thing we have learned over the years is that it’s rarely a good idea to manipulate the landscape as these people wanted. Such projects often have unforeseen ecological consequences, as well as expected ones; tend to overlook the impact on marginalized groups; and are typically a short term solution to a long term need. But, such issues rarely stop ambitious land meddlers, and I suspect that we will continue to see schemes like these arise in the future. Be wary of them.

---

If you’d like to subscribe to this newsletter, click on this cerulean button.

I will be leading tours along the waterfront this summer for the Friends of the Waterfront. They are free. Here’s a link with information on dates and how to register.