The Sweden backed Sea Traffic Management programme has received €4.5m EU funding for a continuation project on passenger and goods flows.
STM itself was a continuation of the EU funded Mina Lisa project. The new project, to be called EfficientFlow will run from 2018 to 2020 and focus on sea traffic management between the ports of Rauma, Fnland and Gävle, Sweden, as well as traffic management for many of the ferries that run through the large island archepelago that stretches between the two countries.
EU funding has supported three iterations of the STM project from 2010 to 2018 (Mona Lisa 1.0, Mona Lisa 2.0, and STM Validation). The project has been focused on creating seamless and real-time data exchange to allow vessels and ports to better co ordinate activities, timings and thus improve logistics inefficiencies.
In a statement from the STM Validation project team, Magnus Sundström, Head of Research and Innovation at the Swedish Maritime Administration, said: “We truly appreciate that the Flow Management part of the STM concept can be tested in a live test bed. Safety will increase even more when ships and VTS Turku work with STM-enabled tools. We also appreciate that STM will be further tested and implemented in ports in the Central Baltic Region. “
Traffic between Rauma and Gävle has increased in recent years as the two ports have deepened their fairways and invested in container terminals. The project will work on how the two ports can better share information in a seamless manner to create efficiency.
