Water transportation upgrades moving forward

DECATUR, Ill. — After over a decade of farm groups advocating for the modernization of the nation’s lock and dam system, new concrete and steel is replacing Capitol Hill rhetoric and delays.

Congress passed the biennial Water Resources Development Act late last year, authorizing $9.9 billion for 46 new flood control, harbor, ecosystem and lock and dam projects on waterways across the nation, and authorizing the study of 24 more projects.

The latest WRDA includes adjusting the cost-share for construction and major rehabilitation of inland waterways projects from 50% Inland Waterways Trust Fund/50% General Revenues to 35% IWTF/65% General Revenues through fiscal year 2031. The move was supported by farm groups.

There is also $2.5 billion in support for lock and dam construction included in the infrastructure bill recently passed by the U.S. Senate and waiting action by the House.

Over 60% of the nation’s grain exports and many other commodities such as fuel, coal and agricultural inputs move through the inland waterway system, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Paul Rohde, Waterways Council’s Midwest Region vice president, gave an update on moves to improve river transportation during the Farm Progress Show where he had a booth in the Illinois Corn Growers Association/Illinois Soybean Association joint exhibit.

As a result of WRDA’s approval last December, an extensive overhaul is underway on the Illinois Waterway that includes the Illinois River and several other rivers that feed into the Illinois.

“Part of that is a major rehabilitation of the LaGrange Lock that occurred last summer. In conjunction with that there was major maintenance of several other lock and dam locations as part of multi-year effort,” Rohde said.

“The next big set of closures will be in 2023. That will also have some disruptions to it, but thankfully we can schedule that. They’re known disruptions which is a lot more manageable than your emergency closures which we’ve seen plenty of those the last couple of decades. That is ongoing.”

In 2023 there will be full closure for 120 days at the Brandon Road Lock and Dam for upper miter gate installation and machinery replacement; a 120-day full closure at the Dresden Island Lock and Dam for upper miter gate installation, valve replacement, machinery replacement and electrical system replacement; 90- to 120-day full closure at the Marseilles Lock and Dam for miter gate machinery replacement and electrical rehab; and 90- to 120-day full closure at the Starved Rock Lock and Dam for miter gate machinery replacement.

Antiquated Locks

The locks on the Upper Mississippi River System were built in the 1930s and 1940s for steamboat-era traffic and 93% of the locks on the Mississippi and Illinois rivers have outlived their design life of 50 years, according to the Waterways Council.

Only three of the 37 locks in the system are 1,200 feet in length, the length of a typical tow on locking rivers. All of the locks on the Illinois River have 600-foot chambers.

The WRDA legislation in 2007 included authorization for modernizing the navigation system and restoring the environment through the then-newly established Navigation and Ecosystem Sustainability Program.

Funding for NESP was included in the fiscal year 2018 and fiscal year 2020 work plans. Funding specifically focused on the navigation features of NESP, followed by focusing on preconstruction engineering and design (PED) efforts for both the navigation and ecosystem projects.

There were seven locks pegged under NESP in the 2007 WRDA that are identified for expansion from 600-foot to 1,200-foot chambers, including the LaGrange and Peoria locks on the Illinois River and the remaining five on the Upper Mississippi River.

“Those would all get 1,200-foot chambers next to the existing 600 foot. So, basically you are turning that 600-foot chamber into an auxiliary, still workable just like it is today, but you have the additional capacity of the 1,200 next to it and you have a two-way river so you don’t have tows waiting like you do now. You can pass one northbound with a 1,200-foot chamber and one southbound with a 600-foot lock chamber,” Rohde said.

“That is part of the NESP program and we’re hopeful with this year’s developments between the fiscal year 2022 appropriations process and the infrastructure package that we’ll be able to get started.”

Legislative Delays

Plans for improving the river transportation system have faced numerous delays.

The 2007 WRDA was authorized by Congress; however, the law did not appropriate funds for those projects and programs in the bill.

“That was authorized in 2007 through an override of President Bush’s veto. His objection wasn’t necessarily the Upper Mississippi and the Illinois River; it was just the price tag of the bill was so large because it had been seven years since another Water Resources Development Act bill had come to pass (in 2000),” Rohde noted.

The next WRDA bill, named the Water Resources Reform and Development, was not passed by Congress until 2014. Since then, new legislation has been passed every other year.

“NESP authorization came in 2007, but we weren’t able to get any construction dollars. We were able to get PED prior to WRDA authorization in fiscal year 2005 to look at the design of the locks. That dried up when then-Speaker Boehner turned the spigot off on congressional-directed funding or earmarks. I think we still had a bit of a black eye from Hurricane Katrina, whether it was deserved or not, for the Corps of Engineers,” Rohde said.

Olmsted Project

“We definitely were in the throes of the construction at Olmsted Locks and Dam,” Rohde said.

The Olmsted Project on the Ohio River was one of the longest and largest civil works projects in the history of the Corps of Engineers and was hampered by multiple delays in funding and many other problems.

When initiated in 1988, funding of $775 million was appropriated by Congress for a new dam and locks. The project was scheduled for completion in 1998, but delays inflated the price tag to over $3 billion in early 2018.

“It did get finished. They’re still demobilizing the two locks that Olmsted is replacing so they still are doing work on locks 52 and 53, but Olmsted is operational and off the books,” Rohde said.

“And the good news part of that is we have been able to get to other projects and hopefully the next one to start will be a NES project on the Upper Mississippi or Illinois River. It will probably be Lock 25 in Winfield, Missouri. That has the most PED accomplished so far, so that design work is there.”