Improved boating regulations

Having recently studied the variations between the national ship traffic rules, aswell as the variations with the IMO's International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea, I believe that the creation of a single ship traffic regulation would be hugely beneficial to simplify and improve boating (hereby eg indirectly also being beneficial to international trade, ...). In addition, I also believe that the use of a single marking buoy system and the use of some new technology (which could replace some older technology; see below) would improve safety at sea.

Firstly, at present several ship traffic rules are present in different countries around the world. As an example, In the Netherlands alone, 5 traffic regulations exist; "Binnenvaartpolitiereglement (BPR)", "Rijnvaartpolitiereglement (RPR)", "Scheepsvaartreglement Gent-Ternuezen (SRKGT)", "Scheepvaartreglement Westerschelde (SRW)", "Scheepvaartreglement Eemsmonding (SRE)". This makes that for each water (inland water, coastal zone) that a ship enters, it must

• have the ship traffic rules for that specific zone on board (in paper)
• be familiar with all the variations regarding the ship traffic rules for this specific zone

Clearly, these requirements not only complicate boating, but also provide a huge strain eg regarding international trade, ... In addition, there is an increased safety risk when captains (which are only familiar with other zones) enter into these zones with different traffic rules.

As such, I believe that the IMO should make an effort in trying to make the "International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea" the only legal ship traffic regulation in all waters (including the coastal and inland waters of -ideally- all nations).

In addition, I believe that the use of different marking buoys (eg CEVNI, ...) should also be disallowed, advocating the sole use of the IALA (either -A or -B) marking buoy system.

Also, it would be best that national/regional water heights (eg in the Netherlands "Nieuw Amsterdams Peil (NAP), Fries Zomerpeil (FZP), Winterschoterpeil (WP), ....) are all swapped with LAT (Lowest Astronomical Tide). In some cases, (the sweetwater) rivers are best physically disconnected from their seawater mouths to simplify this measure (and for reasons of preserving water, ....) See regarding this issue the image: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Freshwater_river_redirection.png

Regarding the maritime navigation system, it struck me that the current system of meridians and parallells is simply not well-chosen. I think it would be better to either opt for a system where either both the horizontal and the vertical lines are either both in parallell or diverging into one centre. I am also working on making an image of this (for which the progress can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Graphic_Lab/Illustration_workshop/Archive/Nov_2009#Globes_with_new_parallells_and_meridians). Perhaps that the IMO could make a computerprogram with this other system of navigation to assess the merits thereof.

Next, I would like to present some thoughts about the use of new equipment. Aldough some of the described equipment is not yet currently used in the maritime industry, I believe that these will improve boating safety and will also allow to discontinue the use of certain less efficient equipment (eg VHF-radio).

First up is the VHF (2-way) radio, as mentioned above. This device could be swapped with WiMax-based digital radio. This digital radio feed could be made available trough a ultra-mobile personal computer (UMPC) system (a possible system is described at http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Improved_UMPC_design ). As WiMax has a far greater range than VHF (the latter being limited to some 20km), and as the sound quality is much better (being digital), WiMax is a much safer choice (especially when employed at open waters).The use of this UMPC would immediatelly also allow the receiving of other important data (again benefitting to the on-board safety). This other important data includes weather data (again trough a digital radio feed, text-based info and/or trough WeatherFAX). The use of an image-based system as Weatherfax btw could possible also be directly relayed to an electronic plotter. This would thus show newly formed depressions/high pressure zones on the plotter, so that the best coarse can be plotted out, using the winds from these zones. The winds should in this case also be best shown on the plotter with high/low pressure zones, whereby the correct wind direction is marked, depending on the location on earth (wind circulation reverses going from the north to the south of the equator or vice-versa).

The UMPC system could then also be used to assist in other tasks; including

• to retrieve a man over board (MOB); for this, is is useful to equip crew members with a RFID-implant. Besides using the RFID-implant to locate crew members, the RFID-implant is also useful to assist search and rescue operations (eg in the event the ship itself also sinks)
• communication between ship captains eg using text-based messaging via WiMax, or even between individual crewmembers of different ships (if several UMPC's are on board)

Ship radar-systems for boating with poor vision are probably better swapped for sonar-systems. Unlike radar (which has originally been developed to track aircraft), sonar is typically much more efficient for tracking objects (eg ships, ...) on water. Besides ships, seaports probably also better switch to sonar.

Regarding the vessel horn, it may be best to attach a computer system (UMPC, ...) to the horn. This would then allow to broadcast more uniform/correct sounds (eg sounds lasting exactly 1/4 of a second, 1 second, ...) and if a microphone is added it also allows additional functions. Adding a microphone allows the computer system to interpret and convert the sounds eg to text. This way, the captain (even if he didn't fully hear the sound or if he doesn't understand it), the computer can inform the captain of what the other vessel meant, simply by showing the text of the message. Also, together with the sound, an ID-code can be sent (similar to showing a light when sounding the horn) to allow the computer to know which vessel sent what message; when displaying the text message, this extra information can also be given. However, if this system is to be used, uniform horn sounds must first be established (as many have different meanings depending on the zone in which is broadcast), and some new ones may need to be established. For example keeping right is often - and keeping left of the water is often --, but turn right and turn left (which eg could replace these; possibly by _- and _-- respectiverly ), full stop (eg _ ), 180° turn right (eg _ _ -), 180° turn left (eg _ _ - - ), reverse ( _ _ ), ....

A remark on the board lights and port/starboard terminology. Perhaps that the board lights are best swapped so that the red lights are right and the green lights are left (in this respect, it would then also be best to use IALA buoys with red buoys on the right side and green ones on the left side). This because red can more easily be remembered with right. The terminology port/starboard can simply be swapped with leftside and rightside (this terminology is at present only used with water surface vehicles as ships and not with any other vehicles).

Finally, it would be useful to make a weather vane aswell as a anemometer, hooked up to a meter (inside the steering cabin) a mandatory piece of equipment for ships. This as it is essential not only to predict the weather, but also to plot out the best coarse (to correct for winddrift/waves). Also, perhaps that an instrument to determine the current is best also made mandatory and hooked up to an indoor meter.