Transportation Support Services 



Adequate channels, harbors, and terminal facilities are essential to efficient 

 maritime operations, and accurate charts, publications, navigational aids, 

 and environmental forecasts are basic requirements for safe navigation. In 

 1969, noteworthy supporting services provided by Federal agencies included 

 the following : 



1. The Coast and Geodetic Survey issued seven new nautical charts and 

 487 revised charts of U.S. waters. The U.S. Naval Oceanographic Office 

 completed 110 new charts and over 700 revised editions of its worldwide 

 chart coverage. 



2. The "navigational lane" system was established by the Coast Guard 

 and Coast and Geodetic Survey for the safety of shipping and installations, 

 in New York and San Francisco Harbors, Delaware Bay, and the Santa 

 Barbara Channel. This traffic control method provides merchant shipping 

 with inbound and outbound lanes, with a buffer zone between them, in the 

 approaches to major ports or congested coastal areas, to reduce the possi- 

 bility of collisions. 



3. The Army Corps of Engineers is studying the use of chemical ex- 

 plosives in harbor excavation. The first full-scale test of the technique is 

 planned for 1970. 



4. The Army Corps of Engineers has 53 coastal harbor and channel 

 improvement projects underway, for which the Federal costs are estimated 

 at $1,764 million. Another 98, to cost $1,672 million, have been author- 

 ized by Congress but not yet funded. 



5. Looking to the future, the Corps of Engineers has studies in progress 

 to determine the feasibility of improving harbors for deep-draft vessels at 

 92 ocean locations and 22 Great Lakes ports. Studies concerning harbor im- 

 provements for light-draft vessels are underway at 2 1 7 ocean locations, and 

 32 on the Great Lakes. Nineteen of these investigations have been completed 

 during the past year. (Closely related is an independent assessment by the 

 American Association of Port Authorities of future port requirements. This 

 study will forecast the size and types of vessels which will be involved in 

 U.S. trade during the next 30 years. Particular attention is being given to 

 the problems created by supertankers and other large bulk carriers.) 



6. The Coast Guard is extending its experimental harbor advisory radar 

 coverage of the San Francisco area. A second radar station will cover the 

 offshore approaches, supplementing the first station which now provides 

 coverage of the harbor inside the Golden Gate. The stations observe and 

 advise harbor traffic, thereby reducing collision hazards and speeding up 

 traffic flow during poor visibility. 



7. The Navy's optimum ship routing program which routes vessels by 

 taking all environmental factors into account, is being further improved by 

 being put into numerical model form to permit computer forecasting. 



8. The Navy, ESSA, and Coast Guard have continued their long-range 

 studies of the Gulf Stream, which are leading to better predictions of its 

 behavior and effect on ship routing. 



A number of national and international projects to improve safety at 

 sea were underway in 1969. The United States signed the International 



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