Celilo Canal - Effect On Navigation

Effect On Navigation

Boosters of the Celilo Canal organized the Open River Navigation Company, and put the Charles R. Spencer and J.N. Teal on the run from Portland to The Dalles, Twin Cities and Inland Empire on the route up the Snake River, and Relief on the run from Celilo to Pasco, Washington. Mountain Gem supported Relief above Celilo

Once the canal was complete, navigation was open on the Columbia from the mouth of the river all the way to Priest Rapids, and, up the Snake River, to the mouth of the Grande Ronde River near Rogersburg. However, completion of the canal came too late to fend off competition from railroads had taken away most of the steamboat's business. Riverine transportation above Celilo never reached the hopes of the proponents of the canal. Only in the late 1930s did the development of wheat barge traffic, eventually driven by diesel towboats, become an important transport method on the Columbia River.