His advisory services were employed by the governments of Belgium, Great Britain, and Russia in such large undertakings as the improvement of the port of Antwerp, the enlargement of the Suez Canal, and the increasing of Black Sea harbor efficiency.

For the authorities of Queensland, South Australia, and India he designed a number of harbors and planned the regulation of several rivers.

In the United States one of Bates's big contracts was the raising of the grade of Galveston after the flood there, and it was he who designed the "three-lake" plan for the Panama Canal.

In 1900 the French government conferred on him a Grand Prix and decoration for "distinguished services to science"; and he was chosen to membership in various foreign as well as American engineering societies.

One was Lindon Wallace Bates, Jr. (1883–1915), a renowned engineer who wrote several books on technical and economic subjects and perished in the sinking of the RMS Lusitania.