Saint Lawrence River and Seaway

▪ river, North America

Introduction

 hydrographic system of east-central North America. It connects the North River (source of the St. Louis River, in the U.S. state of Minnesota, which flows into Lake Superior) with Cabot Strait, leading into the Atlantic Ocean in the extreme east of Canada, crossing the interior of the North American continent for some 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometres). It is of vital geographic, hydrologic, and economic importance to the United States and Canada.

      The St. Lawrence system can be divided into three broad sectors. Upstream lies the Great Lakes region, with narrow riverlike sections linking the broad expanses of the lakes themselves. In the centre, from the eastern outflow of Lake Ontario, near the Canadian town of Kingston, to the Île d'Orléans, just downstream from the city of Quebec, the system passes through a more normal watercourse. From the Île d'Orléans to the Cabot Strait, between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, the system broadens out again, first as the St. Lawrence estuary, and then, passing Anticosti Island, as the oval-shaped marine region known as the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The discussion here is confined primarily to the latter two sectors. For a treatment of the Great Lakes sector, see Great Lakes.

      The St. Lawrence is a mighty and unique hydrographic system. Bedded in an ancient geologic depression, it drains the heart of a continent. It is at once an international, an intra-Quebec, and a multiprovincial system. An axis of regional population, it is also a waterway linking Canada and the United States to western Europe and a large part of the rest of the world. The frontages of the several regions of the St. Lawrence River are not equally developed and do not maintain the same types of relationship with their hinterlands and with the outside world. Throughout its length, nevertheless, the St. Lawrence retains a great natural beauty.

      The St. Lawrence Seaway, a massive navigational project undertaken jointly by Canada and the United States and completed in 1959, opened North America's industrial and agricultural heartlands to deep-draft ocean vessels. It forged the final link in a waterway some 2,340 miles long from Duluth, Minn. (at the westernmost point of Lake Superior) to the Atlantic by clearing a throughway in a 186-mile stretch of the St. Lawrence River between Montreal and Lake Ontario. Although the official seaway consists of only this stretch and the Welland Canal (connecting Lakes Ontario and Erie), the entire Great Lakes–St. Lawrence system, with 9,500 miles of navigable waterways, has come to be known as the St. Lawrence Seaway.

Physical features

Geology

      The St. Lawrence River occupies a geologically old depression that involves three great geologic regions of North America: the Canadian Shield, the Appalachian Mountains, and the intervening sedimentary rock platform. This ancient setting has been broken up by movements of the Earth's crust along several zones of structural weakness and also has been worn down by a number of separate cycles of erosion. Toward the end of the Quaternary Period, the glaciers that had occupied the depression since the Pleistocene Ice Age were replaced by the Champlain Sea, which flooded the depression from about 13,000 to 9,500 years ago. A subsequent slight uplifting of the continent was enough to expel this arm of the ocean, and about 6,000 years ago a residual riverlike watercourse—the St. Lawrence—was established.

Physiography

      The regional division of the St. Lawrence raises difficult problems, and, despite considerable scholarly work on the subject, the debate remains open. The following division has been based on such overall criteria as longitudinal gradient of the riverbed, tidal characteristics, salinity, the width of the river bottom, human geography, and animal life. Threshold zones, a dozen miles or so in length, mark the transition from one region to the next.

      The St. Lawrence of the International Rapids section forms a clearly defined region extending from Kingston to above Montreal, where the presence of sudden breaks of gradient in the riverbed, the necessity of a navigable route between Montreal and southern Ontario, and the regional needs for power have led to the creation of hydroelectric stations, canals, and a major part of the St. Lawrence Seaway. The flow volume of this section of the St. Lawrence, as measured at Cornwall, Ont., is about 218,000 cubic feet per second (6,100 cubic metres per second).

      The region of the Quebec lowlands is made up of a short section with a calm and nonreversible flow. This portion of the river course is characterized by the inflow of the system's principal tributary, the Ottawa (Outaouais) River, by the presence of numerous islands, by the development of the greater Montreal conurbation, and also by a certain amount of water pollution. The development of the port of Montreal has depended on, among other factors, the deepening of the river channel—downstream through dredging and upstream through canalization—by means of engineering projects that were begun in the 18th century. During the winter months, a thick crust of ice connects the two banks of the river, and icebreakers maintain an open channel for shipping. In the past, the possibility of ice jams was great, with notable ice catastrophes occurring in 1642, 1838, and 1896. However, the port of Montreal has been kept open year-round since the mid-1960s.

      The upper estuary extends from Lake Saint-Pierre to below the Île d'Orléans at Quebec. There, the current of a freshwater tide begins to be reversible. During the winter months, the ice covering recalls the conditions at Montreal, but it also anticipates those of the middle estuary (see below), where a distinction is necessary between banked (or reef) ice, which is solid and fissured, and conglomerate ice, which moves past offshore. High bluffs rising from the river littoral, which had great strategic value, led to the foundation of the city of Quebec in this region, in 1608. The immediately adjacent area became the historical cradle of the distinctive French-speaking population of Canada.

      In the middle estuary, from the eastern end of the Île d'Orléans to the upstream side of the confluence with another major tributary, the Saguenay River, the St. Lawrence broadens but remains relatively shallow. Progressively, the water becomes more brackish, and with an east wind it may be possible, for the first time, to catch the scent of seaweed. Tides, thrust into a narrowing channel, attain maximum height in this section. Breakaway reef ice from this area constitutes one of the major sources of ice in the downstream parts of the estuary.

      The lower estuary, one of the greatest topographic alterations in the entire course of the St. Lawrence, is found near the Saguenay confluence, at right angles to a submarine furrow. In this region, the river bottom exhibits a significant break of gradient: within 10 miles of the confluence, the depth of the water increases from about 80 feet (25 metres) to 1,145 feet. It is by way of this drowned valley that the cold, heavy, marine waters from downstream hug the bed and enter the region. In spite of the width of the watercourse, a number of ferries connect the two banks. In contrast to the thinly settled northern bank, behind which lie the inhospitable, rugged landscapes of the Canadian Shield, the southern frontage of the lower estuary is open largely toward its hinterland; and major roads, including the Trans-Canada Highway, lead away from the river toward New Brunswick and other Canadian maritime provinces.

      The limits of the maritime estuary are, upstream, the promontory of the Pointe-des-Monts and, leading to the Gulf of St. Lawrence (Saint Lawrence, Gulf of), Anticosti Island. (The latter, by reason of its size and its own circular currents, is an entity in its own right and cannot be considered as an element of the estuary.) Below the Pointe-des-Monts, the submarine valley mentioned above doubles in width, to more than 50 miles. A major arm of the counterclockwise current stemming from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, after entering the northern portion of this region, turns back to the east. The salinity found there discourages ice formation, and, on the northern shore, the port of Sept-Îles—although situated much farther north than Montreal—is in fact easier to keep open to navigation in winter. The north frontage, with a hinterland rich in iron ore and hydroelectric-generating potential and running at right angles to this portion of the estuary, offers great economic possibilities.

Climate and hydrology

      In terms of both climate and hydrology, the St. Lawrence system as a whole covers several zones. First, in the movement downstream from the upper part of the system, some of the associated boreal character is lost; in its path from the northern streams tributary to Lake Superior down to Lake Erie, the system passes from a subarctic to a more temperate southern zone. This pattern is reversed in the eastern half of the system; thus, from the western end of Lake Erie to the northern coast of the St. Lawrence estuary, the climate again reverts progressively to a subarctic level. This basic division brings out the regional contrasts in the hydrology of the central section of the river. Lake Erie, for example, loses much water through summer evaporation, whereas the affluents feeding the estuary of the St. Lawrence are heavily influenced by snowfall characteristics. At Montreal a good portion of the river flow comes from the Great Lakes—hence its remarkable regularity. At the mouth of the estuary, on the other hand, the volume of ocean water coming in at high tide is considerably greater than the volume of river water flowing down at low tide; and there the St. Lawrence is profoundly marine, rather than fluvial, in character. These basic regional hydrographic traits are also accentuated by large seasonal variations in water temperature.

Plant and animal life

      The biological world of the St. Lawrence region is relatively unchanged, although it has been influenced by humans for centuries. Some clear regional distinctions have been made between the upper and lower sections of the system and also between the depths and the surface of the water and between the banks and the centre of the river course.

      Animal life comprises fish (including sturgeon, smelt, and herring), mammals (including the beluga [white whale] in the gulf), and mollusks (including the soft-shell clam [Mya arenaria]). A noted phenomenon, which is characteristic of all regions of the river, is the massive migration of ducks (waterfowl), bustards, and geese, which make use of the sandy shores or river reefs as seasonal food sources. The vegetation associated with the river undoubtedly reflects the great shrubby zones that extend from Lake Erie to the northeast of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, made up of deciduous forest, mixed forest, coniferous forest, and open taiga. In addition, however, it exhibits such specifically river-linked characteristics as the sandbank grasses of the freshwater section and the halophytic (salt-tolerant) plants found from the middle estuary onward.

Louis-Edmond Hamelin Pierre Camu

The economy

 The seaway has had a major economic impact on the United States and Canada. A principal reason for its construction was the discovery, in Quebec and Labrador, of vast deposits of iron ore needed by steel mills in the United States. Canada, an importer of American iron ore before the seaway opened, exported ore, the second largest commodity, to the United States thereafter. The largest commodity moved is grain, from farms on Canada's prairies and in the American Midwest, shipped through the seaway at considerable savings. Major users of the seaway are vessels known as lakers, which are designed to the maximum limits of the seaway locks in order to facilitate two-way trade. A laker can pick up grain in the western Great Lakes, destined for world markets, and return with Canadian iron ore, loaded in the lower St. Lawrence. The third-largest seaway commodity is coal, moved chiefly from U.S. mines via the Welland Canal to Canadian steel mills and power plants. Another commodity that is significant—because of its value rather than the amount moved—is imported iron and steel.

      Bulk commodities make up about 90 percent of annual cargo tonnage, but vessels of many nations also use the seaway to deliver or pick up general cargoes.

      The Great Lakes–St. Lawrence River system has become one of the world's most heavily used international trade routes. Some 35 to 40 million tons of cargo move annually through the Montreal–Lake Ontario section. Although the system often is characterized as a vast inland sea comparable to the Mediterranean, its use is restricted by limited access and by a severe winter climate that shortens the shipping season to about eight and a half months. In 1959 the seaway allowed passage of about 80 percent of the world's ships, a figure that has since decreased. The size of a vessel that uses it is limited to a draft of 26 feet, a length of 730 feet, and a beam of 76 feet. These dimensions have become relatively small by the standards of world cargo-ship construction.

History

Early navigation

      Efforts to sail into the heart of the continent date from 1535, when the French explorer Jacques Cartier (Cartier, Jacques), seeking a northwest passage to the Orient, found his path blocked by the Lachine Rapids, southwest of what is now Montreal. The digging of shallow St. Lawrence canals for bateaux and Durham boats (long, tapering boats with flat bottoms and auxiliary sails) in the early 1780s; the construction of the Erie Canal from Buffalo, N.Y., to the Hudson River from 1817 to 1825; the opening of the first canal around Niagara Falls in 1829; and the completion of the first lock, at Sault Sainte Marie, Mich., in 1855, all fostered the dream of a navigable waterway into the continental interior. The United States, however, proved a reluctant partner in a venture, pursued by Canada from the beginning of the 20th century onward, to open the Great Lakes to sea traffic. The U.S. Senate rejected the Seaway Treaty of 1932 and allowed a second treaty, signed in 1941, to remain unratified for eight years. Faced with the likelihood that Canada would proceed alone, the U.S. Congress finally approved participation in the project in May 1954.

Construction of the seaway

      The seaway project was one of the largest civil engineering feats ever undertaken. Construction began in the summer of 1954 and took nearly five years to complete. Over its course the project employed some 22,000 workers and utilized enough cement to build a highway 1,000 miles long and enough steel to girdle the Earth. About 6,500 people living in riverside communities had to be relocated, bridges were raised, and tunnels, dikes, and roads were constructed. Locks had to be constructed in the seaway and modernized in the Welland Canal to raise and lower large ships a total of 557 feet, making it the world's greatest waterway lifting operation. It takes about seven minutes for water to pour in or out of a seaway lock; the average locking takes about half an hour. To overcome the navigational hazard of the swift-flowing, 226-foot fall of the St. Lawrence River between Lake Ontario and Montreal and to develop its hydroelectric power potential required an investment of more than $1 billion.

      For the navigation portion of the project, the Canadian government built two canals and five locks around the Cedar, Cascades, and Lachine rapids and three seaway dams; and the U.S. government built two locks, a 10-mile canal around the International Rapids, and two seaway dams and cleared shoals from the Thousand Islands section of the river. This series of operations created a waterway 27 feet deep, replacing six canals and 22 locks that had been limited to a depth of 14 feet.

      In order to make the seaway operational, a number of other projects had to be undertaken as well. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers deepened the Straits of Mackinac, between Lakes Michigan and Huron; the St. Marys River, between Lakes Superior and Huron; the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair, and the St. Clair River, between Lakes Erie and Huron; and many Great Lakes harbours. In addition, between 1913 and 1932 Canada had built seven lift locks of seaway dimensions in the Welland Canal, which overcame the 326-foot plunge of the Niagara River and Falls, between Lakes Erie and Ontario. The seaway became operational in April 1959.

      To tap the considerable energy of the river's tumbling waters, the seaway project included the construction in the International Rapids section of the Iroquois Control Dam near Iroquois, Ont., and the Moses-Saunders Power Dam near Cornwall. The project created the 30-mile-long Lake St. Lawrence. Generation of hydroelectric power began in July 1958. The generating capacity is shared equally by Ontario and New York state.

Financing the seaway

      As the price of approving seaway legislation, the U.S. Congress required that the seaway project be self-liquidating; the Canadian government also adopted this as a national policy. Tolls (toll) were to be assessed at a rate sufficient to pay back the cost of the project in 50 years, to pay annual interest on the funds borrowed to build it, and to pay all operating costs. The two nations jointly established a system of tolls, with each nation collecting tolls in its own currency. This resulted in a split of about three-fourths of the revenue to Canada and one-fourth to the United States.

      Revenues from tolls in the early years of the seaway's operation consistently fell far short of annual operating costs and interest payments, putting the seaway deeper in debt. Neither the Saint Lawrence Seaway Authority, operating Canada's installations, nor the Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation, running U.S. operations, was able to increase tolls to keep pace with higher operational costs until the late 1970s, when a new Joint Seaway Tariff of Tolls agreement was accepted by both countries. Tolls were again increased in the early 1980s. Annual shipping tonnage had reached its peak in 1977, however, after which a gradual decline ensued. Thus, despite the increase in tolls, revenues generally continued to fall short of expenses.

      In the mid-1980s the U.S. government assumed the financial obligations of the American seaway corporation. The tolls that were collected (the American share by this time had been reduced to 15 percent of the total) were returned as rebates to the seaway's users, and the federal government provided direct subsidies to the American corporation. The Canadian authority, meanwhile, continued to operate as before and to charge tolls. The incentives to shippers offered by the rebates, however, helped stabilize seaway traffic by the end of the decade.

Roger William Benedict Pierre Camu

Additional Reading

The geography, hydrology, and physical features of the St. Lawrence River and Seaway are detailed in Canadian Hydrographic Service, Sailing Directions, Gulf and River St. Lawrence, 6th ed. (1985). Ronald L. Heilmann, Harold M. Mayer, and Eric Schenker, Great Lakes Transportation in the Eighties (1986), reports shipping and economic conditions in the area. Relevant information is found in Seaway Review (quarterly). A short study, The Great Lakes St. Lawrence System: The World's Richest Economic Region, Served by the World's Most Efficient Trade Route (1984), offers a pertinent overview. Historical surveys are provided in Gennifer Sussman, The St. Lawrence Seaway (1978); and Jean-Claude Lasserre, Le Saint-Laurent (1980).Pierre Camu

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