The invitation for tenders was awaited with keen anticipation throughout the world, as it was conceded to offer a unique opportunity to the electrical engineer. Consequently keen competition was evinced to secure the honour of carrying out such a remarkable undertaking. The contract was secured by the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company, and was carried to a successful conclusion at a cost of £100,000 ($500,000). The locomotives now used on this service are among the most powerful in the world. They weigh 135 tons, and develop about 2000 horse-power, which enables them to haul a 1000-ton train up the heavy approach grades at a minimum speed of 10 miles per hour. Moreover, since electricity was adopted, the tunnel has been kept free from the dense clouds of smoke and steam which originally converted the tube into a veritable inferno, and, what is far more important from the railway company’s point of view, the electrical system is able to meet three times the volume of traffic that exists to-day, so that there is ample provision for the future. As it is, the 2¼ miles of line beneath the teeming St. Clair River is the heaviest electrically worked section of railway in the world. Another link with the United States, however, was incumbent to bring the manufacturing centres around Buffalo into closer communication with the Dominion. Yet there was only one point where this link could be provided--across the gorge through which the Niagara River, after tumbling over the lofty cliff, seethes and boils on its way to Lake Ontario. A suspension bridge met the exigencies of highway traffic for some years, but here again improvement was demanded. Accordingly, a new bridge was planned, and this constitutes one of the most graceful structures spanning that fearful rift. The old bridge fulfilled its services faithfully for forty years, and when demolished was found to be possessed of several years of life. The new bridge is a splendid work, and its close proximity to the Falls offers a striking comparison between the handiwork of Nature and that of the engineer. The bridge leaps across the gorge in a single span, and when one is speeding over the structure in the train, one is at an elevation of 226 feet above the raging waters below. The span is of no less than 550 feet, and the ends are secured to massive anchorages sunk into the face of the cliffs. It is wrought throughout of steel, and is approached from either side over a single truss span 115 feet long, giving a total length of 780 feet.