ABSTRACT
This chapter describes how the conflicting requirements of efficient and safe shipping, the environment, international and national maritime law, and available or attainable water space can be resolved, using a combination of all of the sciences concerned with the sea and its shores, traffic engineering, communications and surveillance techniques. Among the several financial considerations that must be considered when contemplating an appropriate traffic routeing system, and must always be remembered as a background to every decision made. A road traffic engineer, faced with the problem of moving traffic across a waterway, has three basic choices, ferry, tunnel or bridge. Shipping is by no means exempt from public attention, remorselessly driven by the media. Many ships discharge untreated effluent directly into the sea, although holding tanks are common, and this effluent from heavy ship traffic is a possible source of gastric and skin disease on beaches in the proximity.
