Cape May Canal
| Cape May Canal | |
 Railroad swing bridge, one of three bridges across the canal
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| Country | United States |
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| State | New Jersey |
| Region | Cape May County |
| Connecting | Cape May Harbor, Delaware Bay |
| Coordinates | 38°57′53″N 74°55′50″W / 38.9646°N 74.9305°WCoordinates: 38°57′53″N 74°55′50″W / 38.9646°N 74.9305°W |
| Length | 3.3 mi (5 km) |
| Width | 100 ft (30 m) |
| Depth | 12 ft (4 m) |
| Founded | 1942 |
| Management | U.S. Army Corps of Engineers |
 Locator map for Cape May Canal
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The Cape May Canal is a 2.9-nautical mile (3.3 mi; 5.4 km) waterway connecting Cape May Harbor to the Delaware Bay, at the southern tip of Cape May County, New Jersey. There is a long history of unfulfilled plans for a canal across Cape May. The canal was finally constructed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers during World War II to provide a protected route to avoid German U-boats operating off Cape May Point and to become part of the Intracoastal Waterway. The canal was dredged as a wartime emergency measure in 1942 and was the final link in a protected waterway intended to allow coastal shipping to travel along the coast with a greatly reduced risk of attack from German submarines.
Albert Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treasury, recommended in an 1808 report that "a series of canals be constructed along the seacoast, cutting across the necks of many peninsulas so as to provide an inland passage for seagoing vessels from Massachusetts Southward through North Carolina." Nathaniel Holmes proposed government aid for a canal across Cape May in the 1840s and the Risley brothers detailed a plan and started dredging a canal from Stone Harbor to Bidwell's Creek.
More serious plans developed after 1905 when Cape May Sound was dredged to form part of the Intracoastal Waterway. Later Cape May Harbor was formed by dredging, and Cold Springs inlet was dredged to form an entrance to the harbor for larger seagoing vessels. The importance of these extensions to the Intracoastal Waterway was underlined when the Navy built a base in 1917 on the south shore of Cape May Harbor. (The base later became a Coast Guard facility, today called the United States Coast Guard Training Center Cape May.)
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