A new hull form for a Venice urban transport waterbus- Design, experimental and computational optimisation

A combination of naval architects experience, modern CFD tools and model testing has been used in the hydrodynamic design of a new waterbus for use in the city of Venice, required to have minimum wave generation at low speed in shallow water, and minimum resistance at higher speed. The free-surface panel code RAPID has been extended for wave making in shallow channels with sloping sidewalls, and has been found to adequately predict the effect of hull form changes and the phenomena occurring in shallow water.