PANAMA.
As the passenger route and highway of the trade between the Atlantic and Pacific States of America, the mention of this line arrests attention. Information in regard to it is full and accurate. Here, alone, in all Central America, a railroad unites the two oceans. Confining his remarks to the project of M. Garella, Admiral Davis pronounces his condemnation of the route.
M. Garella’s route, starting from the Bay of Limon, on the Atlantic, following the valley of the Chagres, ascending with 17 locks to the summit, which it passes with a tunnel 17,500 feet in length, at an altitude of 135 feet above high water in the Pacific, and descending with 18 locks, terminates at the Bay of Vaca del Monte, on the Atlantic. The altitude of the ridge to be pierced is 459 feet. The commission of the “Ponts et chaussés” appointed to report upon Garella’s project, object to the expense of tunneling, and to the absence of evidence of the sufficiency of the mountain streams to feed the summit level.
But a tunnel is not a necessary plan of piercing the Isthmus at this point, nor is a summit level 135 feet above high water an unavoidable necessity. The Panama railroad passes the divide without a tunnel, at an altitude of 280 feet above tide. The fact that a route possessing such advantages should be found so near the line of M. Garella, encourages the belief that a more critical examination of other prescribed routes may be rewarded with the same good fortune.
The merits above mentioned justify a more attentive consideration. The advantages of the route may be enumerated as follows:
1. A divide 280 feet above tide.
2. Distance between oceans 48 miles.
3. The Chagres river, emptying into the Atlantic, and the Rio Grande, flowing into the Pacific, together with the smaller rivers, Maraboso, Obispo, Dominica, Mandingo, which can be made tributary to the summit level of the canal. The rainfall in this region varies from 90 to 100 inches, being three times the amount which ordinarily falls in the United States.
4. The harbors at the termini, Panama and Aspinwall, have accommodated the trade of California and the Atlantic States, and are far superior to those of Port Said and Suez.
5. Tunnel unnecessary.
Possessing such advantages, the objections which have led to the ignoring of this route should be noticed.
The objection of the Commission of French Engineers to M. Garella’s project has been mentioned. “The river Chagres,” it was observed, “was gauged at Cruces and Gorgona, but the river is to be tapped above these points.”
The summit upon Garella’s line is 459 feet above tide, while upon the line of the Panama railroad it is but 280 feet. Garella proposes to pierce the ridge, at 135 feet above tide, with a tunnel three and four-tenths miles in length. No tunnel is required upon the other line.
| Estimating the tunnel of M. Garella at the present contract price in the United States, this part of the work alone will cost | $57,623,380. |
| Add 47 miles of open canal | 84,232,491. |
| Total cost of canal | $141,855,871. |
A canal by the aid of locks can be constructed between the two seas, upon the line proposed by Col. Hughes, at a much less cost.
Assuming the same dimensions of canal—100 feet wide by 30 feet deep—and the same prices as above, taken from General Michler’s report upon the survey of the canal for joining the Atrato and the Pacific, and we obtain the probable cost of constructing a canal upon this line, as follows:
| For 50 miles of open canal | $ 89,610,150 |
| 12 locks raise the summit level 75 feet | 12,000,000 |
| Breakwater, ship basin, and contingencies | 8,000,000 |
| Total cost of canal | $ 109,610,150 |
This diminution of cost of $32,245,721, due to the absence of a tunnel, upon this route, allows of a margin more than can be required for increasing the number of the locks, or for building, graving docks, and other auxiliary conveniences in the harbors.
The execution of this work would require a cut of less dimensions than the famous Mexican Desague of Huehuetoca, referred to by Humboldt, and described by Admiral Fitzroy as “200 feet deep and 300 feet wide for nearly a thousand yards, and above 100 feet deep through an extent of nearly a thousand yards, (making altogether two miles of distance in which the vast excavation would be capable of concealing the mast-head of a first-rate man-of-war, executed in the last three centuries in Central America,) should induce us to listen respectfully to the plans of modern engineers, however startling they may appear at first.”
Another objection remains to be considered: “Navy Bay is an insecure anchorage, and the harbor upon the Pacific is altogether insufficient for vessels of even moderate draught.” “M. Garella is obliged to include in his estimate the sum of a million and a quarter dollars for the improvement of this harbor.”
On account of the rise of the tide, which varies as much as 22 feet, vessels are compelled to anchor two and one-half miles from Panama, and the passengers and freight are transported in light-draught steamers. These difficulties may be converted, by the use of docks, as in English harbors, into an advantage. The withdrawal of 20 to 23 feet of water at extreme tides affords extraordinary facilities for constructing ship basins and docks upon the natural pavement of rock which covers the bottom of the bay in front of the City of Panama.
On the other side, Limon Bay possesses sufficient depth of water, but is open to “northers.” The entrance of these dangerous winds may be prevented by a stone breakwater, or one composed of screw piles, driven sufficiently near to support iron or flanged plates, sliding vertically into position, one above another, until the requisite height is attained, and braced strongly at the back.
Notwithstanding northers, steamships arrive and depart regularly. The Royal Mail Steamship Company are building wharves of stone and iron, and the railroad company has projected a breakwater for the protection of shipping.
Colonel G. W. Hughes, in a letter to the Hon. J. M. Clayton, at that time Secretary of State, makes the following observations in regard to this route: “The line I have traced for a railroad is, I think, more favorable for a ship canal than that suggested by M. Garella. If we adopt the same depth of cutting he suggests for an open cut, it will leave the bottom of the canal 44 feet above the level of the Pacific at high tide. This would be about ten feet lower than the bed of the river at Gorgona. An open cut two hundred feet deep would obviate all difficulty in crossing the Chagres at Gorgona, while the Rio Grande, the Obispo, and the Mandingo might be converted into an immense reservoir for supplying the summit-level with water, and the Rio Chagres above Cruces, and the Pedro, Miguel, Camero, etc., would furnish the lower level. A spacious tide basin might be constructed at the mouth of the Rio Grande, a few miles west of Panama.”
For this project, so favorably recommended, it is necessary to obtain the consent of the Panama Railroad Company to the use of land belonging to their reservation.