33 CFR § 329.8 - Improved or natural conditions of the waterbody.

Determinations are not limited to the natural or original condition of the waterbody. Navigability may also be found where artificial aids have been or may be used to make the waterbody suitable for use in navigation.

(a) Existing improvements: artificial waterbodies.

(1) An artificial channel may often constitute a navigable water of the United States, even though it has been privately developed and maintained, or passes through private property. The test is generally as developed above, that is, whether the waterbody is capable of use to transport interstate commerce. Canals which connect two navigable waters of the United States and which are used for commerce clearly fall within the test, and themselves become navigable. A canal open to navigable waters of the United States on only one end is itself navigable where it in fact supports interstate commerce. A canal or other artificial waterbody that is subject to ebb and flow of the tide is also a navigable water of the United States.

(2) The artificial waterbody may be a major portion of a river or harbor area or merely a minor backwash, slip, or turning area (see § 329.12(b) of this part).

(3) Private ownership of the lands underlying the waterbody, or of the lands through which it runs, does not preclude a finding of navigability. Ownership does become a controlling factor if a privately constructed and operated canal is not used to transport interstate commerce nor used by the public; it is then not considered to be a navigable water of the United States. However, a private waterbody, even though not itself navigable, may so affect the navigable capacity of nearby waters as to nevertheless be subject to certain regulatory authorities.

(b) Non-existing improvements, past or potential. A waterbody may also be considered navigable depending on the feasibility of use to transport interstate commerce after the construction of whatever “reasonable” improvements may potentially be made. The improvement need not exist, be planned, nor even authorized; it is enough that potentially they could be made. What is a “reasonable” improvement is always a matter of degree; there must be a balance between cost and need at a time when the improvement would be (or would have been) useful. Thus, if an improvement were “reasonable” at a time of past use, the water was therefore navigable in law from that time forward. The changes in engineering practices or the coming of new industries with varying classes of freight may affect the type of the improvement; those which may be entirely reasonable in a thickly populated, highly developed industrial region may have been entirely too costly for the same region in the days of the pioneers. The determination of reasonable improvement is often similar to the cost analyses presently made in Corps of Engineers studies.