Hoquiam WA waterfront (#1334)

I am assuming that the silos are for grain?

Most likely. Per the Wikipedia page on the railroad, they ship grain and soy beans to the port.

Probably soft wheat grown in the Palouse, and shipped by barge down the Snake to the Columbia and then here. IIRC the winter wheat grown there is more suited for noodles than bread.

The rail yard is quite active, so I'm suspecting much of it is shipped here by train.

One of the more surreal sights we got used to when we lived in E. Washington was giant grain elevators right on the Snake and Columbia reservoirs. They were to fill the barges.

And sure enough, I thought I might have an old fuzzy pic, from 30 years ago:
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/23554219/in/album/508515

I should take some more next time we're back up there--

I'd thought that the Snake didn't have locks, but it turns out the lower Snake, downriver from Hells Canyon does have locks: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_River

Yup! Barges go all the way to Lewiston, ID, and the Corps of Engineers is very proud of that fact. So is Lewiston, btw. When we lived in Pasco, WA in the late 80s, the Snake was one of our favorite areas for picnics and camping. At one time there was lots of access, due to things like old railroad grades that had had to be realigned. Lots (but not all) of the previously private land along the river had also been bought out by the Feds when the dams were built. It was surreal to be camping at night down in the Snake's canyon, where it's very dark--you can't see the lights on the farms on the plateau above--and see one of the barges go by, lights a-blazing. At least back then they ran them 24/7. Of course, I have very few pix from those days: here's one of a navigation marker along the Snake, above Little Goose Dam IIRC:
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/23554227/in/album/452677
When we next get thru that area I'd like to get more pix--it's be more difficult than it was then, tho, because post-9-11 the roads across those dams are now closed to the public! Usta be you could just drive across. Alas--

PS: The Corps of Engineers' stated rationale for damming the Hanford Reach on the Columbia, above Richland, was so that barge traffic could go all the way to Wenatchee. Of course, they just wanted to build dams! Ironically, it was probably the presence of Hanford that kept the Reach undammed. It's now the only undammed stretch of the Columbia in the US, and is finally protected as a wild and scenic river. I have a few pix:
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/22867069/in/album/669731

When I was in Vancouver (WA) in August, I wondered how much traffic there was above the ports there. I'd never seen any barge traffic on the Columbia, but then I've only been on it about three times. Now I'm curious. I had planned to try to see some of the monument that's been created for Hanford last summer, but ran short on time for doing that part of the trip.

Re your photos, because I didn't realize there was barge traffic up that way, I would have been confused by seeing the navigation sign. It is frustrating that they've banned getting on many of those dams -- many of them are wonderful pieces of architecture.

I even have a fuzzy pic, taken a few years ago, of a barge loading on the Columbia! www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/32851903/in/album/669731
There are other elevators here and there along the Columbia below the confluence with the Snake as well.
I suspect the navigation markers are still there on the Snake, because of regulatory inertia, but I would imagine these days the barges are all tied into GPS!