On November 28, the tugs HELEN M. McALLISTER and SALVAGE MONARCH towed the idle C.S.L. package freighter FORT WILLIAM out of Hamilton, bound for Collingwood, where the motorship will be converted into a three-hold, airslide-equipped cement carrier for service for the Lake Ontario Cement Company. Her commissioning next year will permit the retirement of C.S.L.'s converted canaller METIS, will relegate the canal motorship DAY PECKINPAUGH (of the Erie Navigation Company) to a restricted service from Oswego down the New York State Barge Canal to Rome, N.Y., and will mean that ENGLISH RIVER will no longer have to serve as spare boat for Lake Ontario Cement, a duty which occasionally has taken her away from her normal service for Canada Cement Lafarge Ltd. On November JO, FORT WILLIAM was still at Port Colborne, awaiting an improvement of weather conditions on Lake Erie.

GORDON C. LEITCH is not the only Upper Lakes Shipping boat to be loaded with storage soybeans at Toronto. R. BRUCE ANGUS has been being loaded recently and, on November 29, was towed from the ship channel to the north side of Pier 35. On November 25, CANADIAN PIONEER arrived with a cargo of beans and transferred them to the idle FRANK A. SHERMAN, moored in the Leslie St. slip.

Contractors have begun the removal of the old guard gate above Lock 7 on the Welland Canal, and will complete the excavation of the structure after the canal closes for the winter. The guard gate has not been used since sector gates were installed at the head of Lock 7, but the structure, with its narrow channel, has remained as a bottleneck for ships. Two-way traffic will still be prohibited in the immediate area, but vessels will no longer have to crawl through the gate's draw in future.

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