Feeder Service Research Articles

Economic Analysis of Container Transhipment in the Eastern Mediterranean Region

With the increasing trade during the second half of the last century; container based transportation facilitated and enabled transhipment operations all over the world and as well as in the Mediterranean. In this context specifically, Suez Canal, which is located between the Eastern Mediterranean and Indian Ocean, offers significant opportunities in the container transpotation between Far East and European trade areas. And since the container ship sizes heading over the 20,000 TEU’s is underway, Mediterranean transhipment operations are heading into a new era; feeder service distances will be more important than the main route deviation distances. The average transhipment ratio is 80% in the Eastern Mediterranean while for the whole Mediterranean is 43% and various markets of the Eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea, Adriatic Sea and Balkan countries can easily access from Cyprus. A container terminal at the Port of Gemikonağı (Karavostasi), North-eastern side of Cyprus is offering ideal conditions for grabbing a share from these activities. As motherland for Northern Cyprus community Turkey’s hinterland, may count on behalf of the proposed Port of Gemikonağı which may become a container transhipment base for Turkey.

Mixed logit approach to modelling arrival time choice behaviour of cemetery and columbarium visitors during grave-sweeping festivals

Special events attract extraordinarily high travel demands over a relatively short time. Managing the travel demand for special events is more difficult than for normal commuting trips. Grave-sweeping is a special event that is popular in Asia, especially in Chinese societies. In Hong Kong, many people visit cemeteries and columbaria around the two traditional festivals, causing overcrowding at the sites and congestion on the access roads. To mitigate the adverse traffic effects, the police usually implement temporary traffic management measures to control the number of visitors accessing the sites. However, these measures often ignore visitors’ arrival time preferences and hence their effectiveness is questionable. This study models and analyses the arrival time preferences of cemetery and columbarium visitors under various transport mode scenarios. The model development is based on 3128 choice decisions collected from 782 respondents. A mixed logit model is calibrated to investigate the potential taste heterogeneity of the respondents, and a likelihood ratio test demonstrates that the model is superior to a standard multinomial logit model and provides a better fit to the survey data. The model results indicate that in-vehicle travel time, total waiting and walking time, and the provision and travel fare of feeder services are significant factors influencing cemetery and columbarium visitors’ arrival time choices. The effects of socio-economic factors are also examined and discussed. Based on the model results, recommendations are provided for managing the travel demand to cemeteries and columbaria at peak and off-peak hours on or around festival days.

Data Preparation to Simulate Public Transport in Micro-Simulations Using OSM and GTFS

Research on demand-responsive collective transportation facilities that can act as feeder services to time-table based public transportation (PT) requires detailed and accurate information about the PT infrastructure, including the attachment of bus stops to the appropriate network link. Due to the size of the infrastructure, the data integration shall be automated. This paper describes the effort to prepare data from publicly available OpenStreetMap (OSM) and General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) sources. Procedures are proposed (i) to build a network derived from OSM suitable for simulations in transportation, (ii) to extract bus stops from GTFS and remove anomalies and (iii) to find candidate network links to attach them.

Market and Institutional Characteristics of Passenger Van Services in Bangkok, Thailand

The market and institutional characteristics of passenger van services in Bangkok, Thailand, are examined. Empirical evidence from the field survey, which included route and ownership types and cost structures, is presented first. Then regulatory and institutional issues in the van services are discussed, with particular attention to the dominant roles of route associations. It was found that passenger vans provide indispensable services to travelers in Bangkok, in terms of both point-to-point services between residential areas and commercial centers and feeder services connecting areas underserved by public transport to rail transit systems. Starting as informal services, passenger vans in Bangkok have become legalized over the years. With constantly growing demand and supply restriction by excessive regulations, the licenses for legal operation have become prohibitively expensive. Together with lax regulatory enforcement and prevalent corruption, there is a proliferation of unregistered vans that compete directly against registered vans. The conclusion contains policy recommendations.

Trip Attraction, Trip Distribution, and Modal Split for Columbarium Trips

Grave-sweeping is a popular special event in Asia, especially in Chinese societies, in which families visit columbaria to express filial piety to their ancestors. The extraordinarily high travel demands usually associated with visiting columbaria during a relative short period around the grave-sweeping festivals severely affect the local traffic. To design and plan adequate transport facilities and services to cater to the travel needs of these families, modeling of their travel demand is a prerequisite procedure. This paper develops and calibrates a non-linear regression model for trip attraction and a joint logit model for trip distribution and modal split using data from headcount and revealed preference surveys collected at selected columbaria during the Ching Ming Festivals of 2013 and 2014. This paper also discusses policy insights gained from the model results that can be applied to the planning of transport facilities and the provision of feeder services to mitigate local congestion during the festivals.

Analytical hierarchy process for assessing sustainability

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to study the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) based on assessment of sustainability indicators for public transportation system including pedestrians and feeder services in developing country. Design/methodology/approach – A hybrid approach based on the AHP is considered for assessment of the sustainability of public transportation system including pedestrians and feeder services. Sustainability related indicators for public transportation system (namely for metro, bus and feeder bus) and pedestrians based on past data were reviewed and subsequently, more important indicators catering needs of developing country have been added to achieve significant sustainability score and a total of 17 indicators were selected for assessment of comprehensive sustainability (seven indicators under economic, six under social and four under environmental categories). Findings – For quantifying the assessment, specific user interview surveys are performed in south Delhi region and accordingly perception of user and transportation-related operational characteristics of the public transport system were also collected. Preliminary result shows air pollution in environmental category, public health in social category and productivity in economic category is most influential parameters in developing country. Originality/value – AHP method is applied for rating the criteria and setting out the priority of designed sustainable indicators. Subsequently sustainable mitigation measures and scenarios for the study area can be evaluated utilizing developed comprehensive sustainability indicator for public transportation system including pedestrian and feeder services available in developing country.

Air Cargo Development in the Regional Airports of the Baltic Sea Region Through Road Feeder Services

Abstract As issued in the Competition Policy Brief on the new state aid rules for a competitive aviation industry by the Competition Directorate-General of the European Commission in February 20141, it will be more difficult for unprofitable airports, to obtain financial public subsidies on EU, national or regional level. Although the positive impact of small airports on the regional development and general accessibility was mentioned, still the operating aid to the airports shall be cut out over a maximum of 10 years. It has been further stated that the vast majority of small and regional airports experience problems to cover their running operative costs, as a result from an intensive market competition and overlapping of airports’ catchment areas preventing even some promising airports from growth. Public subsidies are mostly used by the airport management for infrastructural investments, to cover operating losses or to attract price-sensitive airlines. Herewith, among other things, the EU Commission is pointing out at the lack of cooperation structures and network strategies among the regional airports and at rather isolated and individual approach during elaboration of the airport development scenarios. However, the Competition Policy Brief permits public aid to regional airports, among other things if there is sufficient transports need to establish transition periods for small airports; the need for more flexibility of the regional airports in the remote areas has been underlined. The EU Commission is expecting herewith not to close the regional airports, but to stimulate them to operate on cost efficient and profitable basis, and that only the most inefficient airports will be closed. To cope with the upcoming challenges the regional airports are demanded now to revaluate and reconsider their future development plans. While focusing on the passenger traffic many regional airports ignore or underestimate the benefits of the airfreight market. Although the air cargo has rather a low volume, but very high revenue yield part. Business internationalization is one of the important driving forces for the airfreight nowadays as well as decreasing air transport costs due to improving efficiency and growing competition among the air carriers. Most regional airports in the Baltic Sea region that act totally isolated, do not have a clear picture of the current situation on the international air cargo market, its future perspectives and sustainable development plans. Trying to meet the market demand, the regional airports are making huge and unjustified investments, e.g. improving airport infrastructure. It is not clear till now which elements of the Pan-Baltic cargo market could be managed as an alternative revenue yielding services for consolidated operation by air or what infrastructure is needed to provide the opportunity for an optimal economic mix of road-rail-air-sea transport? Nowadays, to a large degree air cargo traffic relies on scheduled, frequent passenger services in hub-and-spoke as well as in point-to-point traffic. Regional airports are presently suffering from a lack of scheduled uplift capacity. The volume currently transported by air in the regional airports is almost entirely based on the occasional charter flights. However, the growth of the air cargo business is likely to be based not only on cargo charters, but to a larger extend on truck-based services for transit shipments. Onward transportation by truck may occur on road feeder service, so called “flying trucks”, where a real truck substitutes a flight. “Flying trucks” are having flight numbers etc., therefore they must be prioritized in many ways in the BSR transport policy. This paper investigates the role of Road Feeder Services concept (thereafter named here as “Flying Truck”) as an optional freight value proposition for the development of the regional airports and their possible participation in the air cargo market as a supplement instrument to generate additional revenue, thus making the airports more profitable and attractive.

国際フィーダー航路の集貨力に関する基礎研究－西日本からの輸出コンテナ流動を中心として－

Container terminals have been developed in many local ports of Japan in the last two decades. They are supposed to be used for container traffics from/to Eastern Asia such as Korea, China, etc. Therefore, the hub function of major ports in Japan has been lost in competitive circumstances with ports in neighboring countries.In this paper, we analyze the export traffics from Japan with consideration of domestic feeder service connecting major ports and local ports, applying an aggregate logit model. Our results show that the shipping speed of feeder service and the value of cargoes, these affect the shift of cargo flow to Japanese main ports from other countries' main ports.

燃料油価格高騰下における内航コンテナ船大型化の経済性に関する一考察

Container terminals have been developed in many local ports of Japan in the last three decades. They are supposed to be used for container traffics from/to Eastern Asia such as Korea, China, etc. Therefore, the hub function of major ports in Japan has been lost competitive circumstances with ports in neighboring countries. To be restored the hub function of major ports in Japan, the domestic feeder service is expected to reinforce by employing large containerships and slow steaming. In this paper, the authors analyze the effect of large containership and slow steaming on the domestic feeder service network in Japan, by using a mathematical model. Through numerical experiments, in the case of employing larger containership to reduce the number of deployed vessels, the economic viability of the slow steaming can be obtained the possibility in higher fuel cost levels.

Public Transport Service Provisions and Policy Implications for Columbarium Trips

ABSTRACT Grave-sweeping is one of the popular special events in Asian cities, especially in Chinese societies, in which families express filial piety to their ancestors during two traditional grave-sweeping festivals in a year. The extraordinary high travel demand is often attracted to columbaria within a relative short period around the festivals, and induces severe impacts to the local traffic. It is challenging for the government and private operators to formulate a public transport service setting to satisfactorily cater all the visitors' travel demand. This paper aims to propose an optimization framework to identify the optimal provisions of public transport services for columbarium trips to achieve consumer surplus or profit maximization. Numerical studies are carried out using the travel demand data collected from a selected columbarium, to examine the effects of different public transport service settings to the policy objectives in various cases. The model results show that the current situation is neither consumer surplus nor profit optimum. Improvement schemes are suggested in relation to allow various fares during different visit periods and provide multiple public transport feeder services to serve the visitors during the high travel demand period.

An exploration of the demand limit for flex-route as feeder transit services: a case study in Salt Lake City

As an innovative combination of fixed-route transit and demand responsive service, a flex-route operating policy had been introduced into feeder transit services. In this paper, a system cost function, combining vehicle operation cost and transit customer cost, is constructed as the performance measure to explore the feasibility of replacing the fixed-route policy with a flex-route policy in feeder transit systems, without disturbing the existing coordination between the major transit and feeder service. The Route F94 flex-route feeder system in Salt Lake City which connects with UTA TRAX Blue Rail Line is chosen for the analysis. The upper bound of demand for implementing the flex-route policy in this feeder service is derived. The results indicate that the Route F94 flex-route feeder system is still likely to have a distinct system advantage in operating environments with occasional request rejections, in comparison with the fixed-route service. As a result of our findings, it is possible to substantially expand the application of the flex-route policy in the feeder transit market.

Trunk and feeder services regulation: Lessons from South American case studies

Many cities in the developing world are engaged in efforts to reconfigure their public transport systems and improve qualities of service. With some notable South American exceptions, a characteristic shared by these cities is heavy reliance on paratransit services, which are often poorly regulated and operated as informal businesses. Current projects and initiatives aimed at transforming public transport systems, more often than not, ignore or restrain the role of paratransit services. While clearly beset by a variety of problems associated with poor regulatory frameworks and destructive competition, paratransit operations often offer advantages in terms of adaptability to the changing urban structures of contemporary developing world cities, and of service innovation, and attempts to eradicate them may be neither pragmatic nor strategic. This paper reports upon an analysis of selected contemporary projects in South American cities that include trunk and feeder services (Santiago, Valparaiso and Quito). Its main focus is on the role of the feeder element in trunk and feeder schemes, particularly when feeder services are provided by paratransit operators or companies formed out of incumbent paratransit operators. Case analysis includes a description of the prevailing regulatory frameworks leading to this option, and its outcome. The paper draws lessons from the selected cases with regard to the strengths and weaknesses of alternative trunk and feeder arrangements, and to possible roles for pre-existing paratransit services. It is argued that the variation of trunk and feeder regulatory frameworks in the case cities (including reward mechanisms, area licensing and concessions) shows, on the one hand, that a variety of alternative trunk and feeder arrangements are possible, and on the other, that solutions and schemes are highly dependent on pre-existing contextual conditions.

Integrating the informal with the formal: An estimation of the impacts of a shift from paratransit line-haul to feeder service provision in Cape Town

Feeder-trunk-distribution service arrangements are a possible means of integrating paratransit services with scheduled services in public transport system reform projects. In such arrangements the transport authority would concentrate on providing or contracting a high capacity trunk service using large vehicles on corridors with the requisite passenger demand, while paratransit operators would be relegated to only providing feeder and distribution services using smaller vehicles in adjacent areas. This paper explores the veracity of a perception amongst paratransit operators in Cape Town that operating feeder services is less lucrative than operating direct services. A public transport cost model is used to explore the implications of such a change in service operation, using cost and travel demand input data currently applicable in Cape Town. The modelling results suggest that individual minibus operators would be more profitable if they only provided feeder/distribution services, but that improved operating efficiencies would come at the cost of a reduction in the required minibus fleet and associated jobs. It is therefore concluded that if a feeder-trunk-distribution scheme is pursued as a means of integrating paratransit into a revitalised public transport system, considerable attention should to be given to developing strategies that absorb as many paratransit operators displaced by high capacity trunk services as possible. Providing feeder and distribution services for new choice passengers attracted to the improved trunk service may hold promise in this regard.

Bus Rapid Transit versus Heavy Rail in suburban Sydney – Comparing successive iterations of a proposed heavy rail line project to the pre-existing BRT network

Both research and international experience have shown that, whilst BRT services allow suburban areas to be provided with a reasonable level of transit access at an acceptable cost, Heavy Rail offers higher perceived benefits to communities even where BRT performs the same or better in terms of travel time, fares or subsidy levels. There is strong support for the extension of Heavy Rail into the North West Area of Sydney, despite an extensive network of frequent and fast bus services operating along three busways and providing single seat service between low density residential areas, regional centres and the CBD of Sydney. This has led to a number of proposals since 1998 for the North West Rail Link that is now under construction and will replace most direct bus routes with rail feeder services. Previous research demonstrated that the project would have ambiguous benefits for existing public transport users in terms of frequency, travel time and fares. This paper examines the various iterations of the project to explore whether the succession of proposals has led to a project that will provide a better or worse level of service, in terms of travel time, than either the initial proposals or the existing network of services.

An integrated model for ship routing with transshipment and berth allocation

This article studies a decision problem faced by short sea shipping companies that operate both container vessels and container terminals. The problem is to jointly decide container ship routing, berth allocation at the terminals, as well as transshipment of containers to minimize the overall operating cost. The problem is formulated as an integer programming model and an iterative decomposition heuristic method is proposed for the solution of this complex problem. Computational experiments are conducted on problem instances that simulate the practice of a feeder service company operating around the Pearl River Delta region. Results show that integrating the decisions on ship routing, berth allocation, and transshipment of containers can achieve significant benefit compared with traditional approaches in which sequential and independent decisions are made.

Passenger Transfer Efficiency Optimization Modelling Research with Simulations

An integrated optimization model is newly developed in this research to improve passenger transfer efficiency of an urban rail station by minimizing average waiting time of transfers in this station with rationalizing the arrival and departure time of trains in view of transfer passenger flows and their feeder services. Corresponding algorithm is also designed to search for the optimal solution to the objective function of the proposed model. A representative urban rail transfer station in Beijing is studied as example to validate the effect of transfer optimization with the new model. Comparative simulations confirm that the proposed model is able to effectively reduce the waiting time of each transfer in a station. This is significant for systematically improving the operation safety of an urban rail transfer station with faster evacuations of transfer passengers as well as substantially saving travel time of passengers making transfers in this station.

A Strengthening Competitiveness of Busan port’s feeder service in Newly Potential Market

A Strengthening Competitiveness of Busan port’s feeder service in Newly Potential Market

The Role of Feeder Shipping in Chinese Container Port Development

Abstract The future development of China's container ports has become a critical issue, due to the sector's dependence on international trade and the excessive interport competition that exists both within China itself and with the ports of neighboring countries. This article investigates the potential for utilizing domestic feeder shipping services (i.e., coastal and river container shipping services that carry both international and domestic cargoes) as a new source of future long-term growth in China's container port sector. The Gini coefficient is utilized as an indicator for assessing the evolution of throughput over time for the 12 major container ports involved in feeder shipping operations in China. By applying decomposition analysis to a time series of throughput data, the key contributions of feeder shipping services to port development are identified. In addition, structural and spatial concentration effects on corresponding market segment components are computed. Finally, research findings provide evidence that there are potential opportunities for container ports to benefit from burgeoning feeder services carrying domestic trade and engaging in coastal transshipment activities.

The Role of Road Transport in Scheduled Air Cargo Networks

For the conduction of quantitative research on airfreight related topics, this contribution summarizes recent efforts to handle intra-continental airfreight surface transport operations in the context of an origin and destination routing model. The distinguishing features of this approach are the O-D scope in combination with the explicit use of period timetables of a sample week, not just weekly averages. Two forms of appearance on intra-continental short- and medium-haul routes – with a complementary and a substitutive function regarding cargo flights – are distinguished: Access and egress of consolidation/deconsolidation airports for delivery and pick-up, and airline trucking (“road feeder services”/RFS, “truck-flights”) of airway billed consignments between two airports. The methodology comprises an empirical characterization of the supply side of both the air cargo consolidation and the airline trucking markets, the subsequent modeling of surface transport links within a scheduled network in terms of the surface links’ network topology, attainable journey times and hours-of service regulation for truck driving, and the simulation of RFS load pattern in the context of a global air cargo model.

Effect of Distributional Assumption of Random Parameters of Mixed Logit Model on Willingness-to-Pay Values

For rational estimation of users’ benefit, it is necessary to understand users’ willingness-to-pay (WTP). In several WTP studies, stated preference data have been analyzed using Mixed Logit (ML) model specification. In ML models, it is necessary to make an assumption regarding the distribution of random parameters. Researchers have developed ML models with different distributional assumptions of random parameters. However, the effect of distributional assumptions of random parameters in ML model on goodness-of-fit and WTP values has not been studied adequately. In the present work, an investigation is carried out in this regard taking reference to a case study of feeder service to bus stop in rural India. Various Mixed Logit models were attempted with different distributional assumptions of random parameters such as normal, log normal, triangular, uniform, constrained normal, constrained triangular, constrained uniform, etc. Variation of goodness of fit statistics and WTP values are observed across different ML models. The work indicates the importance of distributional assumption while developing ML model in WTP studies. The work also indicates that it is desirable to develop several ML models with different distributional assumptions and then select the superior one based on goodness of fit statistics.