Recently, it has become available to use high and accurate ship handling simulator in various fields. This paper reports some practical applications of ship men
euvering simulator to port and harbor facilities as case studies, and a reasonable way of applying simulator to port and harbor planning. Paper also describes some simulation results due to basic ships maneuvers under conditions of simplified water area.
　Simulation experiments lead to following conclusion,
i) It is very effective method to use ship handling simulator for surveying marine traffic safety or evaluating marine traffic facilities in actual planning of water area. ii) Large number of experiments would be required to get accurate evaluations concerning to traffic safety of facilities. The reasons are that ships motions are dynamically changed by natural forces and a simulator is a man-and machine system containing human factors. iii) In designing water area facilities, following items are now considered; ship's sizes, geograohic conditions and marine traffic conditions. The results of this study emphasize that additionally the characteristics of ship motions especially in low speed area should be considered. iv) In planning of water-way where ships of poor maneuverability or strongly influenced by natural forces pass through, the vent part of waterway should not only be cut at corner but also be enlarged at both sides of curved area.