Feds Award $1.3M Toward C&O Canal Aqueduct Restoration
HAGERTOWN, Md. (AP) -- The National Park Service is providing $1.3 million to help restore the Conococheague Aqueduct in the Chesapeake and Ohio National Historical Park at Williamsport.
The park service said in a statement Monday that the federal funds will be matched with nearly $7.6 million from the state of Maryland.
Park Superintendent Kevin Brandt says the project is the centerpiece of a plan to create a "premier historical attraction" near the canal's midpoint.
He says visitors will be able to ride a boat through the aqueduct, under a railroad lift bridge and through a working canal lock.
The aqueduct last carried canal boats over the mouth of the Conococheague Creek in the 1920s. It is one of 11 aqueducts along the nearly 185-mile canal between Cumberland and the District of Columbia.
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