Navigational
charts are critical to boating safety, and have evolved to meet to the changing
needs of boaters and the use of technology.
BoatUS: NOAA National Charting Plan Looks to the
Future
“We don’t expect
paper charts to go away anytime soon”
Hooray to that! (ed)
Many in the
boating community have recently expressed concern after learning of a proposed
plan for the “sunsetting” of paper navigational charts, which was listed among
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National
Charting Plan, released earlier this spring.
A closer
reading of the strategy however, according to the BoatUS Foundation for Boating Safety and
Clean Water, reveals a forward-looking approach that sets a course to enable
the Office of Coast Survey’s Marine Chart Division to continue to meet the
evolving needs of boaters into the future. The member-funded nonprofit
Foundation serves as the safety arm for the more than half-million member Boat
Owners Association of The United States (BoatUS).
“The way we
access data today is different than how we accessed it 10 years ago, and we
believe there’s a good chance it will be different 10 years from now,” said
BoatUS Foundation Vice President Susan Shingledecker, who serves as the boaters
voice on the 15-member NOAA Hydrographic Services Review Panel, which advises
the federal agency on the nation’s navigational charting needs. “The National
Charting Plan shows that NOAA is looking to evolve its products and use its
resources efficiently to meet the changing needs of its users. Having nautical
charts available in a range of formats is key to boating safety, and we don’t expect
paper charts to go away anytime soon.”
To ensure
concerns were recognized, comments filed today with NOAA by BoatUS Government Affairs said, “BoatUS feels strongly
that NOAA’s charting products need to continue to be available in a wide range
of formats. …We see some form of paper charts as an essential need for the
foreseeable future.”
BoatUS also
notes in its comments that charts are likely moving to the metric system and
will require boater education. The BoatUS Foundation expects to increase its
educational outreach as that occurs.
Among the
proposed boater-friendly changes in the National Charting Plan, according to
Shingledecker, are more frequent chart updates – weekly, instead of long
intervals, and the better integration of data with other agencies such as the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Coast Guard, which could mean
integrating the latest channel depths and aid to navigation positions. The plan
also allows NOAA to focus attention on underserved waterways, such as resolving
chart discrepancies in areas of importance to recreational boaters.
“We see a more
efficient chart production that allows more frequent updates of obstructions,
discrepancy resolution and exploration of using crowd-sourced data,” said
Shingledecker. “Boaters on the Intracoastal Waterway, for example, need to know
what the channel depth is today – not what it was last year. The plan is simply
a starting point to get us there.”
NOAA also
responded to boaters’ concerns in a blog
post today, ensuring boaters that, “The draft plan does not offer a
timeline for ending the production for NOAA paper charts or (Raster
Navigational Chart) data. We expect this process may take decades to complete,
as user communities continue to adopt electronic navigation and our production
system and products continue to improve.”