The Cross Florida Barge Canal was the dream of generations—a shipping canal across Florida, connecting the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean.
![A map of the Cross Florida Barge Canal A map of the Cross Florida Barge Canal](/sites/flmd/files/images/figure-23-cross-florida-barge-canal.png)
In the 1960s, President Kennedy revived the project. Contractors created dirt pile hills and backhoe bucket valleys. A machine called a crusher-crawler (pictured below, left) flattened thousands of cypress trees along the Ocklawaha River. A dam was built creating a lake, now known as Rodman Reservoir, which flooded more than 1,000 acres of hardwood trees. A completed canal project ultimately would impact the ecology of a 40-mile stretch on the 70-mile Ocklawaha River.
Crusher-crawlers like this one razed acres of trees along the Ocklawaha River in the 1960s (left). A small boat cruises along the Cross Florida Barge Canal (right).