Safety of Navigation and Spatial Planning at Sea

Until recently the concept of spatial planning concerned only land areas, chaos prevailing at sea in this scope. Vessel routes were selected by the Master on the principle of “freedom of navigation”. It was similar with the submarine routes of pipelines and cables, wind farm construction zones, excavation of aggregates, or the conduct of any human activity at sea. A systemic approach is introduced and preferred currently, which is to take into consideration the natural conditions and human achievements on one hand, and look ahead on the other, systematising procedural ac-tivities and minimising possible conflicts of interests among potential users of the sea.