Nostalgia & History > 2020 Hindsight: Trains Are Running, But the Boats Are Not

Most years, by the time that spring starts to really get going in upstate NY, the Erie Canal is being slowly filled with water in anticipation of the boating season.  Not so this year.  During the first wave of the Covid pandemic, it was decided to delay the opening of the canal by several weeks.  Eventually it did open, but not before  a few weeks of scenes that you ordinarily would not see.

Here we are on May 3 a half mile upstream of the Fort Plain lock on the Mohawk River, watching as what's left of the Amtrak schedules to Niagara Falls zip by.  Around 5 PM, within 15 minutes of each other, we have eastbound and westbound Amtakkers.  Note the obvious absence of vegetation just above the water line.  In the next month, they will start damming up the river, one lock at a time, to raise the water level to the point where boats and barges can safely pass.  But in the meantime, we have a hillside in the background that obviously thinks it is springtime:  the grass is green, the trees are starting to bud, and all that.  Down on the river bank, it still looks like March. 

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Oops, meant to post this on the eastern board.  Don't  think that this qualifies as nostalgia just yet.

Yet!

Posted from iPhone

Lots of luck to find any barge on the canal.  Don't think they exist anymore.

I don't think there's anything regularly moving barges currently, but right around  the opening day, and right around closing, it's common to get dimensional loads. 

There was still an operator delivering calcium brine ( used as an additive to allow concrete pours under winter conditions) up until a couple years ago, using one of the most bedraggled tugs I've ever seen. This wasn't a good year for pouring concrete, I suspect. 

Private recreational boaters are all you will find on the canal.