Gadkari takes tour of Mississippi Inland waterways

Aimed at developing inland waterways in India, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari today took a tour of world's most commercially viable inland waterways system of the Mississippi river here.
Following the tour, the Union Shipping, Road Transport and Highways Minister said the ability to move more cargo per shipment will make barge transport both fuel efficient and environmentally advantageous.
Carbon dioxide emissions from water transportation will be much less as compared with rail transportation, he noted.
Mississippi river system river has 40,000 kms of navigable water covering almost the entire North America.
During the visit Gadkari exchanged views on the land port operations with the St Louis Port authorities, assessing the feasibility of similar arrangements in making the Ganga river waterways navigable in an effective and commercially viable manner.

Gadkari, who is on a week-long official visit to the US, also undertook a boat ride in the grueling heat and witnessed effective lock based system along with senior officials of his ministry, a media release said.

He examined the towboats pushing barges lashed together to form a big tow as an extremely efficient mode of transportation, moving about 22,500 tonnes of cargo as a single unit.
A single 15-barge tow is equivalent to about 225 railroad cars or 870 tractor-trailer trucks.
If the cargo transported on the Mississippi inland waterways each year had to be moved by another mode, it would take an additional 6.3 million rail cars or 25.2 million trucks to carry the load, the officials told Gadkari.

He said like in the US, the Indian government will also manage the inland waterways in India.
"We too can maintain a draft of two and half to three meters as is the case in the Mississippi river inland waterways. Indian river waterways can be operational all round the year unlike in the US where they remain closed for some time in a year," he said.
Inland waterways, he said, will also allow tremendous savings in fuel consumption, reduced greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution, reduced traffic congestion, fewer accidents on railway and highways and less noise and disruption in cities and towns in line with the policies of the Narendra Modi government.

He said barges when built in India will help the movement of large quantities of bulk commodities and raw material like coal, petroleum, stones, sand and gravels used in road and highway building and food grains at relatively low cost.