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A day-long seminar on "The Science of Transport" was held at Kirkwall, capital of the Orkney Islands. A lot of discussion centred around ferry travel. The Orkneys are currently served by 4 ferry services: 3 from the north coast of Scotland and a big one from Aberdeen. The presenter from Pedersen Consulting argued that the future lay in consolidating the shortest route or routes: in exchanging sea miles for road miles to short, high frequency routes. A couple of points arise from this. The higher the petrol price, the more attractive become the cheaper sea miles to the traveller. But more importantly, what about the effects on the roads and towns en route to the short routes? Bypasses and dualling? The Isle of Man service from Heysham was held up as a short route model: was the presenter unaware of the Lancaster Northern Bypass demanded certainly in part due to surges of traffic from the ferry?