Lock repair celebrations
Washington Ag Today May 30, 2011 U.S. Senator Patty Murray will keynote a Columbia Snake River lock repair celebration being held tomorrow. The Pacific Northwest Waterways Association, which represents river transportation users, like grain shippers, is hosting the event at Vancouver Landing in Washington State just west of the Red Lion Inn at the Quay at 10:30 am. During an unprecedented planned 15-week closure of the navigation system, the Army Corps of Engineers successfully replaced downstream lock gates at The Dalles, John Day and Lower Monumental navigation locks and conducted other maintenance work in the system. Kristin Meira with the Pacific Northwest Waterways Association, talked about the significance of the work in a recent interview. Meira: “This is just a tremendous investment in the Columbia Snake River System. This means that we will have a new found level of reliability on our inland navigation system. We will have navigation locks that should work properly for decades to come now. And we are just very grateful for this injection of funding and work into our river system.” The association specifically thanks Senator Murray for securing the federal funding for the projects. It was reported at last week’s Washington Grain Commission meeting that wheat shipments down the Snake and Columbia have kept the locks running at full capacity since the navigation system reopened in March. The system is billed as the number one U.S. export gateway for wheat and barley. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s Washington Ag Today on Northwest Aginfo Net. ?
