St. Lawrence Seaway opens, officials mark 60th anniversary

The St. Lawrence Seaway's 2019 navigation season has started with American and Canadian officials marking the binational waterway's 60th anniversary.

The Washington, D.C.-based Saint Lawrence Seaway Development Corp. says executives from the agency and U.S. transportation officials joined their Canadian counterparts Tuesday at the St. Lambert Lock in Montreal to mark the anniversary and the waterway's opening for the season.

The U.S. operates the seaway with the Canadian St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corp.

With its opening in 1959, the St. Lawrence Seaway linked the Great Lakes region and North America's heartland to global markets. Since then, the engineering marvel has seen nearly 3 billion tons of cargo move through the waterway.

The seaway opened to commercial shipping in April 1959.