CHAPTER VII THE CANAL AS IT WILL BE IN submitting its report, the minority of the Board of Consulting Engineers expressed the belief that a lock canal is the better one for the United States to construct for the following reasons: 1. Greater capacity for traffic than afforded by the narrow waterway proposed by the Board. 2. Greater safety for ships and less danger of interruption to traffic by reason of the wider and deeper channels which the lock canal makes possible at small cost. 3. Quicker passage across the Isthmus for large ships or a large traffic. 4. Materially less time required for construction. 5. Materially less cost. This report included a detailed plan for a canal which, in many important features, conformed to that of the Commission of 1899-1901. In the former, however, the dimensions are increased, the main dam is placed at Gatun, instead of at Bohio, and the terminal lock on the Pacific side is moved from Miraflores to Sosa. This is in the main the plan upon which the work is being carried to a conclusion. The chief deviations from it are, the return of the terminal lock to its former site at Miraflores, and a general increase in the dimensions. The plan, briefly stated, involved a channel commencing well out in the harbor in the Bay of Mindi, and continuing at sea level to Gatun. Here a large artificial lake was to extend to Obispo, where the passage of the Culebra Cut begins. At Pedro Miguel the summit level terminated with a set of locks and a smaller lake extended to Sosa, where sea level was again reached by the channel, which continued out into the harbor. The bottom of the channel under this plan would lie at 40 above sea level for the greater part of the distance, and in the alternative plan for a tide level canal at 40 below, a difference of 80 feet. This entire difference would be saved in excavation where the ground stands at an elevation of 40 feet or over. But, as the lock plan contemplates a much broader channel, the disparity in the quantity of work required by each is somewhat lessened. From Gatun for about 20 miles through the lake practically |