What if the Erie Canal had gone differently?

A ditch across New York State connects the Great Lakes to the Atlantic and makes New York the American port.

If it had gone differently: The American interior stays cut off from the coast; the Midwest fills up decades later and through other cities.

The real history on Wikipedia ↗

Later turning points that leaned on the Erie Canal. Change it in the game and the ripples reach all of these.

1. 1869The transcontinental railroad. Without it, The American West stays remote; settlement and the national market crawl for another generation.
2. 1870The first globalisation. Without it, The world economy stays a patchwork of regions; no belle-époque boom, and no 1914 shock when it unwinds.