New York State Canal System
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New York State Barge Canal
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Lock 30 at Macedon, 2006
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| Location | 17 counties in upstate New York |
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| Area | 36.7 square miles (95 km2) |
| Built | 1905–63 |
| Architect | New York State Engineer’s and Surveyor’s Office: Edward Bond Austin, Frank Martin Williams, David Alexander Watt, A.A. Conger, William R. Davis |
| NRHP Reference # | 14000860 |
| Significant dates | |
| Added to NRHP | October 15, 2014 |
| Designated NHL | January 11, 2017 |
The New York State Canal System (formerly known as the New York State Barge Canal) is a successor to the Erie Canal and other canals within New York. Currently, the 525-mile (845 km) system is composed of the Erie Canal, the Oswego Canal, the Cayuga–Seneca Canal, and the Champlain Canal. In 2014 the system was listed as a national historic district on the National Register of Historic Places in its entirety, and in 2017 it was designated a National Historic Landmark.
The Erie Canal connects the Hudson River to Lake Erie; the Cayuga–Seneca Canal connects Seneca Lake and Cayuga Lake to the Erie Canal; the Oswego Canal connects the Erie Canal to Lake Ontario; and the Champlain Canal connects the Hudson River to Lake Champlain.
In 1903 New York State legislature authorized construction of the "New York State Barge Canal" as the "Improvement of the Erie, the Oswego, the Champlain and the Cayuga and Seneca Canals". In 1905, construction of the Barge Canal began; it was completed in 1918, at a cost of $96.7 million. The Barge Canal's new route took advantage of rivers (such as the Mohawk River, Oswego River, Seneca River, Genesee River and Clyde River) that the original Erie Canal builders had avoided, thus bypassing some major cities formerly on the route, such as Syracuse and Rochester. However, particularly in western New York State, the canal system uses the same (enlarged) channel as the original Erie Canal. In 1924 the Barge Canal built the Gowanus Bay Terminal in Brooklyn to handle canal cargo.
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