The invention of the diesel engine in 1892 eventually led to the conversion of fuels for transportation from coal and steam to diesel and the internal combustion engine. This was greatly enhanced by World War I military uses and the beginning of a new age of fuel usage and consumption. The Rivers and Harbors Act of 1909 set national policy for an intracoastal waterway from Boston to the Rio Grande,[4] and the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1910 authorized a 9-by-100-foot (2.7 m × 30.5 m) channel on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway between the Apalachicola River and St. Andrews Bay, Florida, as well as a study of the most efficient means to move cargo. Between 1910 and 1914, navigation channels were deepened, and the screw propeller proved efficient for improved steering and flanking qualities.[4] Also during this period the Panama Canal Act was passed, in 1911; it proved key to the revival of waterway transportation in the United States, because the opening of Panama Canal in 1914 allowed coastal shipping to extend to the US west coast for the first time. The law also prohibited railroads from owning, controlling, or operating a water carrier through the canal and led to succeeding legislation that eliminated monopoly of transportation modes by railroads. The country's World War I experience demonstrated the need for bulk cargo transportation, with Congress establishing the Federal Barge Lines and spurring development of cheaper ways to transport farm commodities, including the first use of standardized freight barges.[4]
