Many of us who live in urban areas live near the water and our first view of the water is from a recreational point of view, which is a great way to see it. However if we look back, the water meant a great deal more to the our way of life. Living in the northeast, the body of water known as the Great Lakes with cities of Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, Buffalo, Toronto, Montreal dominate the landscapes. From the library a book about the history of the Great Lakes called The Golden Dream by Ronald Stagg, Dundurn Press, Toronto, 2010 was picked up. In this book the example is the St Lawrence Seaway where ships can travel halfway through North America. When the earliest explorers came they were trying to find a shorter way to China than going around Africa. Also the usual hunting for gold and silver was a reason to go travelling, which a couple of hundred years later was found. When the explorers travelled down the St. Lawrence they came across rapids, where hydro electric plants are now days, but the rapids must been similar to the ones seen on the west coast. As settlements grew up on the other side of the rapids and given the roads of the day were the rivers, many thoughts went into how to move goods around the rapids. In the early years, because the boats were relatively small, canals were built to accommodate the small boats.

Every 10 years brought an increasing sized boats and no real plans to enlarge the canals, by the time there was a desire to enlarge the canals because the grain trade and bulk commodities such as coal and iron ore were needed to be shipped at a cost effective manner, there was never an agreement who should pay for the expansion of the canals or locks on the Seaway. Part of the reason was other possible methods were coming forth – railways can move commodities to ocean ports, roads and trucks, and various towns and cities had grown up not dependent on the shipping. With most operations there tends to be competing interests who have to taken care of. That which seems logical to do or the straight line thinking, in the real world of needing government help, the line with waver and flow until the people with the greatest concern with the problem are in power. One or another community will benefit or think they will benefit and other communities think they will suffer or may suffer with the investment by the governments. In the case of the Seaway with two countries and their appropriate levels of government nothing is simple, except the dream.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, in the case of the Seaway, which was designed for the freighters to move commodities at a lower price than the competitors, by the time governments invested in the Seaway (years had passed) the economy had changed. The backbone of the economy moved from ships, to rail, to road and from the large institutional uses on the waterfront to more recreational uses. Every time there was a shift, there company would have to be flexible enough to capitalize on it and keep their competitive position. As a shareholder you have to be aware of the competing interests towards your company, how they change and how important they are. Goodwill moves for all sorts of reasons.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions