As the economy becomes increasingly specialised and globalised, the importance of logistics also increases. For global transportation systems, seaports play a key role as transhipment hubs. As seaports incorporate and coordinate hinterland logistic activities within the activities of the port, the strategies they employ influence the decisions made by both local and global logistic service prov…
Network structures have been diffusely adopted in logistics systems, where the most critical target is completing the delivery within the promised timeframe. This paper focuses on a single commodity in a multistate intermodal logistics network (MILN) with transit stations and routes to involve three parameters: a route’s capacity, delivery time and time window. There is a carrier along each r…
This article considers thc perennial topic of how to achieve an equilibrium balance between stability and competition in intermodal shipping. It argues that competition is becoming destructive, but that the imbalance is difficult to correct in a climate where competitive pressures are strong everywhere and restraints on competition are unfashionable. In this context, pricing of intermodal servi…
This paper focuses on logistics centre concept and benefits for users. Intermodal benefit, forwarders impact, IT solutions, new transport flows due to synergy, better supply chain management, additional services, cost sharing, economies of scale, quality of the services, know-how, joint marketing impact, and benefit for growth of third-party logistics services are presented. The main bottleneck…
To be competitive with other modes of transport, railways need to be cost-effective. In order to become more competitive in the logistics sector, Indian Railways has taken new initiatives to improve their operations in recent years. A rail–truck intermodal transportation service for Indian Railways is described in this paper. The main focus of the research presented in this paper is on the jo…
The vessel-to-rail intermodal transfer of containers can be performed either within the marine terminal, called on-terminal or outside the marine terminals, called offterminal. The off-terminal is the common way of rail loading, whereby the marine containers are combined with other, non-maritime containers to achieve greater utilization of yard and rail equipment. The on-terminal transfer, a no…
Rail has increased its share of the British freight market in the past decade. One particular growth market has been intermodal traffic, where consignments are carried in unit loads (i.e. containers and swap bodies): these accounted for one-fifth of rail freight volumes in 2006/07. In this paper, the key trends are identified, considering both port and domestic services. A critical component of…
Retail traffic is one of the main drivers for the growth of intermodal transport services in the UK. This paper examines the key factors underpinning this modal shift in order to learn lessons for other market and geographical contexts. Since successful retail intermodal logistics involves many actors, this paper is based on semi-structured interviews with major UK retailers, third-party logist…
This article describes the trend towards European green initiatives in the transport sector. The introduction of green logistics management and green policy in Europe has been analysed to understand better the positive impact of green policy on environment, society and economy. With the most recent EU initiatives in the field of green logistics, intermodality has become the platform for green l…
This paper presents a method for assessing the financial viability of a new Freight village financed by private and public investments. The financial evaluation model constitutes four distinct phases, namely (a) site selection and traffic forecasts, (b) definition of services offered and corresponding dimensions, (c) estimation of investment and operation costs and (d) evaluation of investments…
The development of intermodal container transport is hampered in part by the cost associated with the shunting of trains in marshalling yards, inland and port railway terminals. Many new technologies have been developed in the past decade, but have still not been applied because of high capital investment costs, lack of sufficient market demand and uncertain rates of return. The key for increas…
This paper presents a dynamic programming algorithm to draw optimal intermodal freight routing with regard to international logistics of container cargo for export and import. This study looks into the characteristics of intermodal transport using multi-modes, and presents aWeighted Constrained Shortest Path Problem (WCSPP) model. This study draws Pareto optimal solutions that can simultaneousl…
Seaports have traditionally been the focus of maritime logistics supply chains. Changing production patterns demanding greater end to end visibility by customers and accessibility to key inland population centers assume greater importance in the organization and design of transport resources and cargo flows.While synchronization of all aspects of the supply chain has become an operational neces…
Despite the growing role of barge transportation in the hinterland access of major seaports in Northwestern Europe, service network design for intermodal barge transportation has received little research attention. In this paper, a decision support model for service network design in intermodal barge transportation is presented. The model determines optimal shipping routes for roundtrip service…
Over the recent years, the usage of containers has dramatically increased; subsequently, port container terminals annually serve more and more intensive flows, which leads to the necessity to find the ways of increasing terminal performance in order to achieve that a growing number of containers would be expeditiously served. The minimization of container handling duration in a terminal would r…
This paper examines the spatial and institutional characteristics of inland port development in Latin America, through an analysis of a detailed case study of the port of Veracruz inMexico. It explores the spatial distribution of seaports and inland ports aswell as the issues of customs clearance, rail regulation, cargo security and land acquisition, before discussing conflicting models of deve…
Shipping lines generally offer their clients two main value propositions: portto-port and door-to-door transport. In addition, some shipping lines offer a third value proposition in the form of transport up to inland terminals (ILTs). This third value proposition combines maritime and inland transport and is offered to two types of customers: shippers and forwarders. These two customer groups h…
The purpose of this paper is to investigate contracts of the intermodal transport market and the incentives they create for a modal shift and thus the financial and environmental efficiency of freight transport.
The procurement of automotive parts efficiently from remote suppliers under poor logistics infrastructure conditions has become a critical issue for car manufacturers located in inland China. This study explores how Japanese auto manufactures located in Sichuan, China have established its automotive parts procurement network and improve its distribution system to cope with severe logistics infr…
In this paper, we study the empty container inventory sharing and coordination problem in intermodal transport. We focus on dry ports in intermodal transport to raise the coordination issue in empty container management. We consider an intermodal transport system composed of one railway transport firm at a dry port and one liner firm at a seaport. First, we characterize the optimal delivery pol…
This paper specifies a dispatching decision support system devoted to managing intermodal logistics operations while countering delay and delay propagation. When service disruptions occur within logistics network where schedule coordination is employed, a dispatching control model determines through an optimization process whether each ready outbound vehicle should be dispatched immediately or …
With their massive transhipment, major seaports in Europe can generate scale economies to operate intermodal transport cost effective to numerous destinations with high frequency. In that way, the ports seem to be able to stimulate intermodal transport and open new markets beyond their traditional hinterlands. The growing container transport by rail between Rotterdam and Northern Italy illustra…
Short distance inland container transport to Western European seaports provides opportunities for additional modal shift to intermodal transport, thanks to the concentration of transport flows transported to the immediate hinterland of these ports. The literature on modal choice behavior, however, fails to explain the (relatively low) success of this market segment. In this paper, a choice-base…
In this paper we analyse the intermodal connectivity in Europe. The empirical analysis is to our knowledge the first empirical analysis of intermodal connections, and is based on a comprehensive database of intermodal connections in Europe. The paper focuses on rail and barge services, as they are the backbone of intermodal freight transport chains. The empirical analysis reveals that rail and …
A hinterland is the landward side of a seaport, whereas a seaport (dry port) is the sea node (inland node) of a hinterland transport chain, i.e. the hinterland transport network over which cargo moves. A hinterland transport chain is jointly determined by seaports, dry ports, intermodal carriers, importers and exporters. A mathematical model is proposed to model this joint choice. Analysis of t…
Scientifi c papers related to intermodal transport research are reviewed in the article. Attention is focused on classifi cation of scientifi c issues of intermodality. Th e methods, algorithms, models used for intermodal transport research are described. Th e areas of huge scientifi c focus and poor areas in intermodality research are highlighted.
The purpose of this paper is to develop a transport portfolio framework (TPF) and explore its use as a decision support tool for shippers wanting to improve their transport system in terms of reducing their carbon footprint.
The purpose of this study is to address an importance of an intermodal terminal regarding container drayage trips, which have a major concern for agricultural product exporters in the Upper Great Plains. Thus, this study aims to develop a geospatial model considering travel distance and total logistics costs for determining an alternative intermodal terminal location.
A commonly suggested measure to make logistics greener is a shift to intermodal road-rail transportation. Most research addresses the issue from the carrier’s perspective, arguing for ways to improve the service production to better fit the shippers’ demand. In this article the issue is addressed from the shipper’s perspective. The purpose is to understand what contextual factors and oper…