Abstract Navigation in polar waters follows standard navigational practice, with special consideration for the presence of sea ice and its expected impact on safe ship operation. Experienced polar ship operators rely on timely access to authoritative sea ice analysis and knowledge of the safe operational limits of their ship to determine the navigability of polar waters. Several sea ice risk assessment frameworks exist to assist ship operators with onboard decision-making, most notably, the Polar Operational Limit Assessment Risk Indexing System (POLARIS). The result from POLARIS is referred to as the Risk Index Outcome (RIO). By adjusting ship speed in response to the RIO value, it is possible to account for sea ice risk in the estimation of ship transit time in polar waters. In this chapter we discuss the use of network analysis techniques to generate the fastest route between two locations in the Arctic and to compute surface ship incident response service areas (IRSA) and incident response isochrones (IRI) for different times of year and ship ice classes. The use of IRSA and IRI to support area-based management (ABM) tools that aim to formally incorporate historical observations of shipping activity into quantitative assessments is also discussed. Incorporating IRSA and IRI results into ABM tools would provide decision-makers with a useful tool to possibly help plan and coordinate incident response in polar waters and support ABM of commercial vessel operation and search and rescue provision.