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WELLAND AQUEDUCT-CONSTRUCTION SCENE
[People’s Press, 7 August 1900]
The above illustration represents a scene taken during the building of the present aqueduct. The work of constructing the arches had just been completed and the construction of the canal floor is under way. The waters of the Welland river pass under the canal through six of these arches. This view was taken from the direction of W.H. Crow’s lumber yard and shows the river lock and lock shanty in the distance.
The first Welland canal was undertaken by private enterprise with William Hamilton Merritt at the head. It was partially completed in 1829, when boats came up as far as Port Robinson, then locked into the river and reached Lake Erie by way of the Niagara river. The water was carried across the river at Welland through a wooden aqueduct on the site now occupied by Rounds’ Mill.
In 1842 the Government of Canada purchased the stock and made extensive improvements, replacing the wooden aqueduct with a stone one-now the “old aqueduct.”
By 1870 the requirements of navigation induced the Government to again enlarge the canal to a 14-foot channel, which necessitated the construction of the new aqueduct.
The new aqueduct, conveying the Welland canal over the Welland river, is one of the finest and most extensive pieces of mason work in America. It is of grey limestone masonry laid in hydraulic cement mortar. The distance from the face of the abutment on the north side of the river to that on the south is 277 feet. There are six arched openings. The rise of the arches is 7 feet and the span 40 feet. The top of the parapet wall is 28 ¾ over the centre part of the intrados. This work was first undertaken by Hunter & Murray, but they were unsuccessful, and abandoned the contract. They were succeeded by Messrs. Beemer & Sullivan, who carried the work steadily and without serious interruption to successful completion. Ten years elapsed between the first letting of the contract, and the completion of the work. The engineer in charge was W.G. Thomson, now superintending engineer of the whole canal.
The work of enlarging the canal cost about $16,000,000.
Ummm, no, this is the third canal aqueduct being built, putting this pic circa 1878 (it was built between 1877 and 1887)
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