Existing terminal facilities include four city-owned piers, several private small-boat piers and a marine and storage yard.

Local interests desire the improvement of the natural basin lying between Eel Pond and the main harbor to consist of dredging an area of approximately 21,000 square yards to a depth of 8 feet below mean low water for anchorage purposes, an entrance channel of the same depth 100 feet wide, and construction of a stone jetty about 700 feet long on the east side of the entrance.

They state that the desired improvement would create a harbor of refuge for small boats where none has existed before, stimulate the recreational boat activities with a resulting increase in retail and boatyard business, and double the quantity of shellfish taken from Eel Pond. They state that with the protected anchorage the local fleet now totaling 50 boats will materially increase and over 500 craft of various sizes will visit the new harbor during the summer season thereby increasing local business through the sale of supplies, boatrepair work and boat storage approximately $52,000 annually. The expansion of the shellfish industry due to the improvement will increase its value from $25,000 to $50,000 annually. Shipyard operators in New Bedford claim that the improvement will produce additional revenue for their yards.

The district engineer finds that the most suitable plan in the area would provide for the construction of an entrance channel 8 feet deep at mean low water and 100 feet wide from the harbor into the basin, and the deepening of an area about 1.3 acres in the basin to a depth of 6 feet at mean low water, local interests consider the recommended plan suitable for present needs. The division engineer concurs in the recommendations of the district engineer.

The Board of Engineers for Rivers and Harbors concurs in general inthe views and the recommendations of the reporting officers and considers the benefits sufficient to justify the cost of the improvement. The Board therefore recommends construction of the improvement subject to the provisions of local cooperation stipulated by the reporting officers.

In accordance with law the Governor of Massachusetts was furnished a copy of the report showing the proposed improvements. In a letter dated July 25, 1947, he approved of the proposed plan of improvement and the apportionment of the cost between Federal and local interests.

In accordance with section 4 of Executive Order No. 9384 the report was submitted to the Bureau of the Budget for information as to the relationship of the proposed report to the program of the President. The Bureau of the Budget advised that there would be no objection to the submission of the report to Congress.

After due consideration of these reports, the Chief of Engineers concurs in the views and recommendations of the Board. The improvement would provide needed sheltered anchorage facilities for present and prospective recreational boat use and its construction is justified. He recommends improvement of Mattapoisett Harbor, Mass., to provide an entrance channel 8 feet deep at mean low water and 100 feet wide into the basin at the head of the harbor, and for deepening an area of about 1.3 acres in the basin to a depth of 6 feet at mean low water, generally in accordance with the plan of the district engineer and with such modifications thereof as in the discre

tion of the Secretary of the Army and the Chief of Engineers may be desirable.

The improvement is recommended subject to the conditions that local interests, first, contribute in cash 50 percent of the construction cost, but not to exceed $33,000; second, provide free of cost to the United States, all lands, easements, and rights-of-way and suitable spoil-disposal areas for the initial work and for subsequent maintenance, as and when required; third, furnish assurances that they will construct at their own expense facilities suitable for landing and mooring purposes of a design satisfactory to the Chief of Engineers, and open to all on equal and reasonable terms; and fourth, hold and save the United States free from damages resulting from the improve

ment.

The cost to the United States for construction is estimated at $33,000. Cash contribution by local interests toward construction is estimated at $33,000. The total cost of construction is $66,000.

The annual carrying charges are esimated at $5,500 including $1,500 annually for Federal maintenance and $2,000 non-Federal.

The annual benefits, while not capable of accurate evaluation, are estimated at $6,000. The improvement will provide a sheltered haven, not heretofore available, for small craft approaching or leaving the Cape Cod Canal, and also eliminate recurrent damages to boats tied up in Mattapoisett Harbor as occurred during the tropical storms of 1938 and 1944. The benefits are approximately equal between local and general interests.

The water area to be served by the proposed harbor is used extensively by recreational craft. The Cape Cod Canal, the artery for recreational craft navigating between the New England summer resorts and the Long Island Sound-New York area, lies only 7 miles northeast of Mattapoisett Harbor. Thousands of recreational craft use this waterway annually.

I might say that the local fleet at Mattapoisett was totally destroyed in the hurricane of 1938, and again in the storm of 1944.

Mr. ANGELL. Colonel, the annual maintenance is $1,500?
Colonel MOORE. Yes, sir.

Mr. LARCADE. Are there any questions by any member of the committee?

Mr. PICKETT. Your cost-benefit ratio is about 1 to 1.12, is that right? Colonel MOORE. The benefits have not been accurately evaluated, but the opinion is stated that the benefits are at least $6,000, which is in excess of the annual costs.

Actually, they are based on estimates of increased local business, through the sale of supplies, of $52,500 annually, and an increase in the value of shellfish, estimated by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation, of between $25,000 and $50,000; a total of something in excess of $77,500 and the district engineer estimates roughly that 10 percent is a fair and conservative measure of the benefits.

Mr. PICKETT. Then your basic justification is recreational and the things that are att dant thereto.

377

Colonel MOORE. There is a large recreational fleet, and the fishing fleet is important, as is the case all along the coast of New England.

Mr. PICKETT. Now, then, Colonel, last year, in the course of the hearings on similar proposals, we got into Buzzards Bay and author

ized some projects there. How far is it from this particular project at Mattapoisett Harbor to those projects we approved last year? Mr. WHITTINGTON. You mean approximately.

Mr. PICKETT. I do not care for tenths of a mile.

Colonel MOORE. I would like to insert a complete statement on that for the record, Mr. Pickett. I do not recall offhand the exact projects that were considered in the last Congress. Buzzards Bay and the south shore of Cape Cod-the north shore, too, for all that matter, and all of New England are dotted with small harbors. I can only say that all of them are crowded. The increase in recreational boating has far exceeded all our forecasts, and you are going to hear of still more projects of this character.

The increase in the number of the boats registered with the Coast Guard of under 16 gross tons has been of the order of 200 percent in the two decades preceding the war. The war, of course, interrupted that growth. But there is every indication that it will be picked up at an accelerated pace in the future as our highways become more and more crowded and people continue to turn to the water for recreation. Mr. PICKETT. In the entire Buzzards Bay area, which is an accessible bay, there is a number of harbors, are there not?

Colonel MOORE. Yes, sir.

Mr. PICKETT. Some of them are commercial; some of them are recreational?

Colonel MOORE. In almost all of them there is a sizable interest on the part of fishermen.

Mr. PICKETT. You have numerous inlets and smaller bays from Buzzards Bay, do you not?

Colonel MOORE. Yes; many of them not improved by the Federal Government.

Mr. PICKETT. You don't happen to know offhand what the relative situation in this proposal is as compared to the approved projects that we recommended in the bill of last year?

Colonel MOORE. The projects in Massachusetts authorized by the act of 1948 were: Falmouth Harbor, House Document No. 566, Eightieth Congress; Provincetown Harbor, House Document No. 600, Eightieth Congress; Taunton River, House Document No. 196, Eightieth Congress; and channel from Buzzards Bay to Buttermilk Bay, House Document No. 552, Eightieth Congress. Cape Cod Bay is separated from Buzzards Bay by the isthmus that connects Cape Cod with the mainland. Cape Cod Bay is north of the isthmus and Buzzards Bay is south thereof; the Cape Cod Canal connects these two bays.

Falmouth Harbor is located on the oceanward side of a bight which separates Buzzards Bay from Vineyard Sound. Provincetown Harbor is in the bight at the northern extremity of Cape Cod on Cape Cod Bay, about 24 miles northeast of Cape Cod Canal. Taunton River empties into Mount Hope Bay an arm of Narragansett Bay near the Massachusetts-Rhode Island State line. The channel from Buzzards Bay to Buttermilk Bay is to restore a natural channel which prior to shoaling provided a waterway between these two bays.

None of the projects authorized by the River and Harbor Act of 1948 provided for a small-boat harbor on Buzzards Bay.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. I have no questions; you have covered it fully. Mr. LARCADE. Thank you very much, Colonel.

STATEMENT OF HON. DONALD W. NICHOLSON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS

Mr. LARCADE. The next witness is very much interested in this particular project, and I think he made an effort before to get this in the last bill on the floor and did not get very much consideration over there.

I am sure this committee wants to give Congressman Nicholson all the consideration it possibly can with respect to this project. We will be glad to hear from him at this time.

Mr. NICHOLSON. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I think the general has given you a picture of it. It is quite a harbor and I think it is about the only harbor of this size on Buzzards Bay. Of course, you have to go into Onset Harbor, through a narrow channel and there is not very much refuge in there.

Provincetown has a substantial harbor, which was approved last year, but, of course, nothing has been done on it.

The only other harbor of refuge we have, from Block Island to Cape Cod is on Martha's Vineyard Island. This is an excellent harbor of refuge now. Our selectmen are seeking to get the harbor dredged out. As a matter of fact, the Eastern Yacht Club and New York Yacht Club used to make an annual pilgrimage to Mattapoisett in the summer time and many are big craft. They are anchored outside.

Fifty percent of the cost of these propositions will be borne by the Commonwealth or the town that is interested. In a great many instances, the people who live in the community chip in and take part of the town's share. It is not a very expensive proposition and the maintenance of it is very low because the tide goes off that way and does not come in very hard. The rise is only about 32 feet. It is different than it is on the other hide of the cape where the tide rises about 10 to 12 feet.

I would like to say, while I am on my feet, speaking about this Winthrop situation, for a great many years the metropolitan district commission had to rebuild the roads that are in back of the sea wall and as I understand, we put out jetties and put a sea wall half a mile out. The saving on the roads alone has run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. So it looks to me like an excellent proposition. I mean the saving of money to the metropolitan district and to the Commonwealth has been so great that it has paid for the amount of money that we have laid out on it just in maintaining the roads alone. Mr. DONDERO. Congressman, is that area pretty well populated, the Mattapoisett area?

Mr. NICHOLSON. In the present project, and then also in the one immediately adjacent to Winthrop Beach.

Mr. NICHOLSON. Of course, they are a great distance apart, about 60 miles. In the summer time, we have a lot of rich people that can afford to own substantial homes and I imagine that in the summer time we have a population at Mattapoisett of around 8,000 to 10,000; but the population of the town is about 2,000 and the valuation is around $4,000,000.

Of course, you realize that all of Cape Cod is just fishing and recreational area. We have not any manufacturers in the whole district.

Mr. LARCADE. This harbor is also a harbor of refuge for ships?

Mr. NICHOLSON. For light craft. There is a harbor in Marion. But you have to go around about 2 miles. This harbor has necks going out on either side of it that extend out, I should say, 2, 21⁄2 miles.

Mr. LARCADO. Thank you very much, Congressman.

Mr. PICKETT. I do not want to interrupt the chairman, but Congressman Nicholson, I take it that you represent a district in which there is a good deal of this Buzzards Bay shore line included; is that right?

Mr. NICHOLSON. I represent it all.

Mr. PICKETT. How many existing authorized projects that require Federal supervision and construction do you have in that Buzzards Bay area?

Mr. NICHOLSON. Thirteen.

Mr. PICKETT. Have any of those been completed?
Mr. NICHOLSON. No, sir. No money appropriated.
Mr. PICKETT. Just authorized and no construction?

Mr. NICHOLSON. All of our harbors, with the exception of Boston Port, are small harbors that have been taken care of through the years by the town and the State appropriating the money, with the exception of the Nantucket. It does not show on the map, but that is an island about 25 miles out from Buzzards Bay, the shore line, and Martha's Vineyard. The Government has not spent any money there, and they spent that-oh, I don't know, probably 100 years ago when they were whaling out of Nantucket.

Mr. PICKETT. You represent the district that runs from the Rhode Island State line on up around to the base of Cape Code area, all of the Buzzards Bay!

Mr. NICHOLSON. I represent from the Rhode Island State line. Providence Harbor all the way around Cape Cod up to Boston on the other side.

Mr. PICKETT. You have 13 projects in that area authorized?

Mr. NICHOLSON. That is right.

Mr. PICKETT. This would be No. 14?

Mr. NICHOLSON. I hope so.

Mr. LARCADE. Are there any other questions?

Thank you very much. You may file a further statement with the committee, if you wish.

Mr. NICHOLSON. I want to thank the committee.

Mr. LARCADE. The next project is Stonington Harbor, Conn.
Colonel Moore.

STONINGTON HARBOR, CONN.

(H. Doc. No. 667, 80th Cong.)

Colonel MOORE. Mr. Chairman, the report on Stonington Harbor, Conn., as contained in House Document No. 667, Eightieth Congress, is in response to a resolution adopted September 25, 1945, by the River and Harbor Committee of the House of Representatives.

Stonington Harbor, Conn., on the north shore of Fishers Island Sound in the southeastern corner of Connecticut, is about 9 miles east of the entrance to New London Harbor. Depths in the outer harbor generally exceed 16 feet except over Noyes Shoal and Noyes Rock.