Design Evaluation of Transport Economy for Fast Ferry

Abstract

Transport economy for a fast ferry carrying passengers, cars and trucks was evaluated from the view point of ship design. A SWATH (Small Waterplane Area and Twin Hull) type fast ferry was selected for the evaluation. Firstly its hullform was optimized to minimize total resistance. After that, its transport cost and fare were determined for several transport routes to evaluate competitively with other transport means, i.e., conventional ferries, land transports, air transports etc. It was found that the fast ferry has enough potential to be operated competitively with other transport means in several coastal routes along the Japan Islands.