Lanemeters

[Ferry-Man]

Hi

I was looking round for the definition of what a lane meter is (dimensionally).

According to http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/dictL.html, a lane metre is 1m x 1 lane, where a lane is 2m.

This is fine, I just thought that the width of a lane on a ferry is slightly more then 2m?

Does anyone know how wide a 'lane' on a ferry actually is?

Many Thanks

[Fergal Clohessy]

i can't confirm otherwise. to the best of my knowledge a lane is 2m wide just as you have said. that's according to my notes on studies for the institute of chartered shipbrokers.
have also heard it isn't unusual for the guys loading vehicles on a car carrier to have to climb out the windows as there isn't enough room to open the doors once the vehicles are loaded. maybe this is in exceptional circumstances though

[Bob Scott]

I did some time as a (sometimes international) truck driver. It was always my impression (don

[Morten]

I am currently employed with the passenger ferry Bergensfjord, between Denmark and Norway, and our lane meter number is based on how many meters we have along the lengths of the lanes no matter the width. The narrowest lanes on deck 1 are 2.9 meters (if we use the dividers) and the widest are 3,6 meters. But that doesn't mean that the wider lane account for more lane meters.
On deck two, our lanes are 1,95 meters wide (2.05 including dividers). So we don't have a single lane which is exactly 2 meters wide.

I would like to point out that a lane is a somewhat weak term onboard a RO/RO (or RO/PAX) vessel. I have never loaded our vessel completely according to the lane dividers! Because then you have a wide load or a narrow vehicle... Or you'll load something transversely to use the space in the best possible way. Same goes for car carriers or flex-deck vessels!

Not sure if this helps:-

   maritime&shipping

[Ferry-Man]

Okay thanks for your responses.  :-D

After just paying a visit to the "Stena Britannica" at Harwich the mate informed me that on the car decks their lanes were 3.5 mtrs wide.

[Fotojoe]

Lanes on "Sea Corona" are (better say: were) 2.80 meters wide on the main deck. Same clearly visible from vessel's general arrangement plan
whereof i have a PDF

[Anton Heuff]

Interesting post, as I always thought a lanemeter is a linear measure. If it represents "an area of deck 1.0 meter in length x 2.0 meters in width", then 1.0 lanemeter would be 2.0 square meters (net, as I understand it) of deck space. As such "lanemeter" is an abstraction, that is we don't have to bother if a 2.0 m wide lane is wide enough for our camper. And am I right that 1850 lanemeter is 3700 sq. m., or is it not that simple?

Regards,

Anton

[Bob Scott]

Anton,
Nothing is ever simple and straightforward in shipping!
Bob

[Pieter_Inpijn]

To make things even more complicated: ferry or ro-ro-capacity is also given in units such as:
cars (european or american size)
trucks (big vans, trucks or 40-feet-containersize+drivercompartment)
trailers (20 or 40 feet long)
buses
TEU's (20 or 40 feet long)
This is in for instance Lloyds Register all used at the same time without any details.
It confuses me very much!

[Fotojoe]

on carcarriers the capacity is calculated in RT43 or, for quite a while now in CEU = "car equivalent unit" , they copied that from the container trade where TEU is used.  :-)