Freight Transportation System Research Articles

About some approaches to real-time railway freight management

The methodology of constructing macroscopic models describing the process of organizing railway freight transportation in real time is presented. One of the key aspects of this methodology is the management of the intensity of freight traffic depending on the workload of stations. This functionality allows the freight transportation system to adjust the speed of trains, optimizing the intensity of freight traffic in accordance with the current situation. Dynamic traffic management helps reduce congestion, optimizes train movement processes and increases the overall efficiency of rail transportation.

Rethinking Global Supply Chain Management in a Changing Environment to Develop an Integrated Freight Transportation System in Bangladesh

Global supply chain management has been a critical aspect of the international business community for decades. With the rapid growth of globalization, companies have been expanding their businesses to different parts of the world, establishing cross-border partnerships and operations, and relying on global trade for their success. In recent years, the environment in which these supply chains operate has undergone significant changes. The COVID-19 pandemic, changes in government policies, and fluctuations in global trade and investment have created a more complex and challenging landscape for companies to manage their supply chains effectively. This has resulted in a need for companies to rethink their supply chain strategies, especially in developing countries such as Bangladesh. The study employs qualitative research methodology to develop an integrated freight transportation system in Bangladesh just after the changing environment of supply chain management due to COVID-19, geopolitics, and other negative impacts that brought supply chain risks/disruptions in the global freight movement from/to Bangladesh through Bangladeshi seaports. The findings of the research brought the transportation disruptions that lead to problems like operation shutdown, lost sales, late deliveries, and reputation loss remarkably. River transport emerges as the overwhelmingly preferred mode, presenting a substantial 60% of the respondents' choices whereas rail mode is only 30% but rail offers advantages in terms of efficiency and cost-effectiveness to make it a strong candidate for transporting goods Furthermore, 41.58% of respondents expressed the view that COVID-19 has significantly disrupted various activities, including the global supply chain and shipping trade. The purpose of this research is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the current state of global supply chain management in Bangladesh and to identify ways to enhance the country's integrated freight transportation system. This research will examine the existing infrastructure, policies, and practices, and suggest mechanisms for improving the efficiency and competitiveness of the supply chain in Bangladesh.

Structure and dynamics of urban freight truck movements: A complex network theory perspective

Knowledge of the core structure and inherent dynamics of urban freight transport systems is important for the development of policies, aimed at improving the livability and sustainability of cities. The past decade has witnessed a great deal of efforts into analyzing the geographic structure of urban freight transport systems. However, in-depth studies on the system core structure and underlying dynamics are still absent. This study contributes to the field by analyzing large scale freight truck trip data from Chinese cities, using complex network analysis. We empirically reconstruct and characterize the urban freight truck mobility networks and reveal the underlying spatial interaction patterns. We develop a spatial network growth model which explains how hub-and-spoke core structure of urban freight transport systems are formed. The developed model captures the essential interaction dynamics of freight locations, and explains the effects of spatial distance, economic size and business pattern replication. Inspired by the model, we provide policy implications for land-use planning, transportation planning and sustainable urban development.

Constructing the Frontier: Russian-Chinese Trade as a Factor in the Modernization of the Far East at the Turn of the 19th and 20th Centuries

The article delves into the development of the transport and logistical infrastructure on the Far Eastern frontier of the Russian Empire during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Throughout the period under study, challenges that emerged in the trade relations between Russia and China led to the creation of a new freight transport system for Russian-Chinese trading. This system proposed the integration of rail and maritime communication, with a sea port acting as the central logistical hub. This vision materialized with the construction of Russian railways in Manchuria, the leasing of Port Russian Dalian on the Liaodong Peninsula, and the initiation of maritime shipping by the China Eastern Railway Company. The article aims to systematically investigate the foundational concepts and the actualization of each segment of this new infrastructure. The research uncovered that the railways, sea port, and maritime shipping orchestrated by the Russian Empire in the Far East were viewed as cohesive elements of a unified trade and transport corridor. This corridor’s primary goal was to forge an effective linkage with the Pacific region. The data assessed in the study indicates that the Chinese ports and market stood as the foremost objectives for Russia’s geoeconomic pursuits in the Far East. In conclusion, the study underscores the importance of these novel infrastructural developments in the frontier modernization of the Far Eastern boundary shared by Russia and China.

Environmental and energy performance of integrated passenger–freight transport

The first-last mile (FLM) transport of passengers and freight accounts for a significant share of total transport costs, pollution, and energy consumption. According to recent scientific literature and institutional inputs at the European level, operational innovations such as the combination of passenger and freight flows may be an effective approach for promoting sustainable and energy-efficient FLM transport. In this study, the energy and environmental performances of an integrated passenger and freight transport system based on the bus network of Zrenjanin (Serbia) were investigated with different future energy mix and transport policy scenarios. The operational aspects of the integrated system were designed through collaboration with territorial stakeholders and an analysis of local planning documents. The performance was evaluated and compared with current public transport and freight schemes considering vehicle fuel and technology, total mileage, and other relevant endogenous and exogenous factors. The results of our analysis indicate operational benefits and energy savings, mainly due to reduced total mileage and the predisposition to shift to the active modes for the last mile. However, most expected long-term energy savings are the result of technological development of vehicles and modal shifts induced by policy strategies.

Singapore International Hub-Port And Its Effects On The Smooth Running Of The Sea Freight Transportation System In Indonesia

Abstract: The Port Singapore Authority (PSA) have a big role in sea transportation in Indonesia, whoever average 50 big vessels per day are tendered at the wharf of Singapore port for loading and unloading thousands of containers, so if Singapore port is congested for several hours the impact will make the crowded of sailing schedule for many vessels. Last week suddenly without any announcement Singapore port reported a problem with their port facilities and so their system, therefore many vessels were anchorages for several days about 4-6 days at the outer of the port for waiting time to tender. This accident makes the sea transport system by feeder service Indonesia-Singapore and vice versa re-scheduled. The impact for export-import activities from and to Indonesia was trouble because many can't call on time even omitted. For several years or starting in 1985 Indonesian Shipping lines depend on Singapore port as an international hub port that will through cargoes to the destination port. They chose Singapore port because there are complete port facilities and a container system, nobody knows that crisis so will bome at Singapore as the biggest port in South East Asia. So now suggested to all of Indonesian shipping and Government to make a new big port as functions like Singapore port as an International hub port.

Maximizing truck platooning participation with preferences

Truck platooning refers to trucks traveling in convoy with longitudinal proximity. By reducing aerodynamic drag, platooning cuts truck energy use and operating cost along with other benefits to the freight transportation system. This research proposes a platform-based platooning system to maximize the participation of truck platooning considering stability of the formed platoons that arises from truck preferences of platooning partners. Preference-based platooning is of both scientific interest and practical importance to the trucking sector, which is highly fragmented especially in the US. The preferences depend on the benefits of fuel saving and schedule adjustment to coordinate the time for platoon formation. The formed platoons are stable in the sense that no two trucks in two platoons want to break away from their current platoons and platoon with each other. Tackling this operation planning problem, the proposed system involves a platform interacting with individual trucks in a way that reduces truck communication and computation burdens, mitigates truck privacy concerns, and overcomes trucks misreporting private information. The central methodological investigation of the interactive process is on how to solve the Maximum Stable Truck Platooning Participation (MS-TPP) problem, for which a two-phase algorithmic approach is proposed. The underlying idea of this approach is to progressively reduce the lengths of truck preference lists, by eliminating truck pairs that do not affect the MS-TPP solution presence and separating trucks in odd rotations – which are key constructs in this approach – from the rest of the truck population. Theoretical properties and computational complexity of this two-phase algorithmic approach are investigated, along with a comparison with an integer programming approach and extensive numerical experiments in the context of a northern Illinois road network in the US. We find that the proposed two-phase algorithmic approach is very efficient compared to the integer programming approach in forming a maximum number of truck platoons while ensuring stability. In addition, the percentage of trucks that end up platooning by solving MS-TPP is much greater than using a greedy approach. The algorithmic approach is computationally scalable for solving large problem instances. The advantages of MS-TPP, in terms of the percentage of trucks in platooning and the average utility gain, become even more prominent as we deal with a larger system with more trucks.

A structural equation modeling framework for studying sustainable freight transportation indicators in emerging economies

The movement of commodities in emerging economies is largely facilitated by freight transit. The major obstacle to developing sustainable freight transportation systems in emerging economies are multiple dynamic uncertainties and inherent sustainability risks. This study determines the major indicators responsible for the sustainability of freight transportation. Initially, 16 Sustainable Transportation Indicators (STIs) are identified through literature and discussed with experts under five sustainability parameters: reputation, overall service quality, resilience, economic model, and job satisfaction. The identified STIs are categorized under the economic, social, environmental, and risk categories. Later, a hypothetical conceptual Structural Equation Model (SEM) is employed to analyze and verify the data. The results from the study show that STIs such as Reputation, Employment Benefits, and Infrastructure and Technology are crucial for the development of sustainable freight transport in emerging economies as they can enhance the efficiency and productivity of transportation systems and, hence their importance must be considered for future deployment of freight transportation in these economies.

A game-theoretic approach to designing carbon regulations in a duopoly freight transportation market: Road and multimodal road-rail competitive systems.

Since the transportation industry produces remarkable carbon emissions worldwide, governments aim to curb these emissions by implementing different carbon regulations. However, little is known regarding how the heterogeneity of transportation systems should be exploited to design carbon regulations. To fill this research gap, the present article formulates carbon cap-and-trade and carbon offset regulations to reduce total carbon emissions produced by road and multimodal road-rail freight transportation systems (FTSs) in a duopoly market; the latter is regarded as a green, energy-efficient transportation mode. A novel procedure is suggested to allocate initial carbon caps that is a hybrid of both benchmark and grandfathering methods. The procedure allows the government to exploit the energy efficiency of the multimodal system, when targeting a reduction of total carbon. Then, a game-theoretic approach is adopted to implement the mentioned carbon regulations. A government, as a Stackelberg leader, maximizes a social welfare function containing economic, social, and environmental dimensions. Under the cap-and-trade regulation, a Nash bargaining process is proposed to trade carbon permits between the FTSs, as the followers, for updating their initial caps. The equilibrium outputs of the two mentioned carbon regulations and a carbon tax regulation are compared. The findings based on an experimental analysis suggest that the cap-and-trade (carbon offset) is the optimal and energy-efficient regulation from the social (economic or environmental) perspective. In terms of policy implications, our findings indicate that the development of a marketplace infrastructure for trading carbon permits is not justifiable under theeconomic and environmental perspectives of the government.

Resilience for freight transportation systems to disruptive events: a review of concepts and metrics

Resilience is a multidisciplinary concept that deals with rapid response and recovery of a system experiencing a disruption. Despite extensive research on this topic, there is a need to clarify resilience concepts in the context of road freight transportation systems (FTSs) from a three-dimensional perspective (i.e., physical infrastructure, users, and managing organizations) and to identify persistent knowledge gaps concerning the characterization and measurement of FTS resilience vis-à-vis disruptive events. This paper addresses these shortcomings through a systematic review of 149 research studies. The synthesis of findings clarifies inconsistencies associated with the characteristics of FTS resilience and in so doing, establishes a unified framework for measuring FTS resilience through the life cycle of disruptive events. Critical data gaps, methodological shortcomings, and a lack of empirical evidence concerning FTS resilience to disruptive events remain. More robust analytical approaches are required to incorporate interdependencies among FTS dimensions into resilience assessments.

Environmental Sustainability of Inland Freight Transportation Systems in Bangladesh

Bangladesh is committed to perform on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and prioritizing climate change issues to create a safe living and working environment for all. Transport has an enormous contribution to society in functioning our daily life also a cause of environmental degradation. More than 95% of containerized cargo are moving from/to Chattogram Port by using road mode that is liable for Carbon dioxide (CO2) emission, congestion, and high transport cost. Rail intermodal is facing capacity constraints in Dhaka rail Inland Container Depot (ICD), and river intermodal is under-utilized for the shortage of hinterland logistics facilities, the mindset of users, and poor terminal productivity. This research applied the quantitative method to analyze the port throughput of Chattogram Port and its hinterland connectivity by nodes to get innovation and sustainability to identify environmental factors in international freight movement economically. On the basis of a literature review, and explored research gaps before data analysis, it is clear that environmental factors including SDGs are not considered in the inland freight transportation systems of Bangladesh. The research findings alerted that people in the freight movement system do not present a wide awareness of their activities and due diligence to environmental sustainability in creating a wider room for the next generations. The quantitative analysis of port throughput data indicated to increase in the share of intermodal especially river intermodal which has a wider scope to use available river ports in all parts of the country naturally. The practical impact of the research is to formulate a long-term environmental strategy in freight transport, corporate execution by all transport business-oriented companies/organizations, and enabling technologies in inland freight operations and monitoring. Overall, this paper provides a conceptual framework for the environmental sustainability of inland freight transportation systems in Bangladesh in doing international shipping and trade.

Modeling the Urban Freight-Transportation System Using the System Dynamics Approach

The dynamic and complex interactions between the urban freight-transportation system and population, economy, traffic flow, fuel consumption, and environmental pollution, make policymaking in this system one of the fundamental challenges of urban management. In this regard, a systemic approach in urban freight-transportation system modelling should be considered to solve the problems of the system. One of the main problems of this system is the mismatch between the freight-transportation capacity and the total freight-transportation demand. Considering the lack of sufficient studies in the field of macro and quantitative modeling of this system, the main goal of this article is to model the urban freight-transportation system in order to identify the factors affecting the urban freight-transportation demand and capacity. The main focus of the research is to develop quantitative scenarios which balance the freight-transportation capacity and freight-transportation demand. The urban freight-transportation system is modelled by the System Dynamics (SD) approach and their basic behaviors; as well as this the results of some policy-making scenarios are simulated. The model is validated by the real data of Shiraz. Five quantitative scenarios are designed with two approaches of managing the freight-transportation demand and freight-transportation-capacity sectors. The scenarios are based on four control variables, including the distribution coefficient, trip numbers, vehicle capacity, and vehicle numbers. The simulation results show that the total gap between freight-transportation capacity and freight-transportation demand will decrease by optimizing each of the control variables. However, the combined scenario is the most applicable policy in order to maintain the balance between freight-transportation capacity and demand. Generally, the proposed model can be used to design different quantitative scenarios in order to optimize the freight-transportation system’s performance. This study can also help policymakers to manage the urban freight-transportation system more efficiently.

Modeling freight truck-related traffic crash hazards with uncertainties: A framework of interpretable Bayesian neural network with stochastic variational inference

Due to the increasing demand for goods movement, externalities from freight mobility have attracted much concern among local citizens and policymakers. Freight truck-related crash is one of these externalities and impacts urban freight transportation most drastically. Previous studies have mainly focused on correlation analyses of influencing factors based on crash density/count data, but have paid little attention to the inherent uncertainties of freight truck-related crashes (FTCs) from a spatial perspective. While establishing an interpretable analysis model for freight truck-related accidents that considers uncertainties is of great significance for promoting the robust development of urban freight transportation systems. Hence, this study proposes the concept of FTC hazard (FTCH), and employs the Bayesian neural network (BNN) model based on stochastic variational inference to model uncertainty. Considering the difficulty in interpreting deep learning-based models, this study introduces the local interpretable modelagnostic explanation (LIME) model into the analysis framework to explain the results of the neural network model. This study then verifies the feasibility of the proposed analysis framework using data from California from 2011 to 2020. Results show that FTCHs can be effectively modeled by predicting confidence intervals for effects of built environment factors, in particular demographics, land use, and road network structure. Results based on LIME values indicate the spatial heterogeneity in influence mechanisms on FTCHs between areas within the metropolitan regions and alongside the freeways. These findings may help transport planners and logistic managers develop more effective measures to avoid potential negative effects brought by FTCHs in local communities.

The information value of logistics platforms in a freight matching market

The information asymmetry in the freight matching of the long-haul trucking industry usually pushes shippers to join a logistics platform that has better knowledge of truckers’ cost information. A logistics platform that is plugged into a freight transportation system helps shippers overcome their information disadvantage but produces the double marginalization effect. We investigate the equilibrium characteristics of a shipper and logistics platform in the freight matching market and find that the shipper prefers to cooperate with the logistics platform in a small-scale sales market but searches for truckers by himself in a large-scale sales market. We show that the information value of a logistics platform for the freight system consists of two aspects: (i) employ low-cost truckers for the shipper and avoid the shipper’s inefficient expansion of the selling quantity in a moderate-scale sales market with greatly heterogeneous truckers, and (ii) improve both the total profit and social welfare of the freight system in a small-scale sales market. We further find that the shipper’s private information may hurt the logistics platform and the logistics platform can mitigate her double marginalization disadvantage by improving value-added services or lowering the logistics price in a large-scale market. Our findings provide guidelines for the shipper and logistics platform on how to choose the appropriate transportation strategy and employment strategy in different logistics markets.

Modular vehicle routing for combined passenger and freight transport

The continuous increase in urban deliveries and the ongoing urbanization of large cities require the development of efficient and sustainable transportation solutions. This study investigates the impact of modular vehicle concepts and the consolidation of different demand types in the route planning on the efficiency of the urban freight and passenger transportation system. Modularity is achieved by connecting multiple vehicles together to form a platoon. The consolidation of different demand types is realized by simultaneously consider passenger and freight demand in the optimization algorithm. The considered vehicles are specific for each demand type by can be connected freely, hence it is possible to transport different demand types in the same platoon. The cost terms in the problem formulation are comprised of travel time costs, travel distance costs, fleet size costs, and cost considering unserved requests. The modular vehicle operations are modeled in a novel pickup and delivery problem which is solved using CPLEX and Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search. In an extensive scenario study and case study in Stockholm, the potentials of the new modular vehicle type are explored for different spatial and temporal demand distributions. A parameter study on vehicle capacity, vehicle range and cost saving assumptions is performed to study their influence on the efficiency. The experiments carried out indicate a general cost savings of 48% due to modularity and an additional 9% due to consolidation. The reduction mainly stems from reduced operating costs and reduced trip duration, while the same number of requests can be served in all cases. Empty vehicle kilometers are reduced by more than 60% by consolidation and modularity. The proposed model and optimization framework can be used by companies and policy makers to identify required fleet sizes, optimal vehicle routes and cost savings.

A data-driven multi-objective optimization framework for determining the suitability of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in freight transport

In order to evaluate suitability of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs) in freight transport systems, this paper proposes a data-driven and simulation-based multi-objective optimization method to deploy charging/refueling facilities for BEVs/HFCVs. The model considers three objectives, namely minimizing total system cost, maximizing service reliability, and minimizing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In particular, a data-driven micro-simulation approach is developed to simulate the operation of freight transport systems with different vehicle and facility types based on the analysis of a one-week Global Positioning System (GPS) trajectory dataset containing 63,000 freight vehicles in Beijing. With the model, we compare the suitability of BEVs and HFCVs within three typical scenarios, i.e., BEVs coupled with Charging Stations (BEV-CS), BEVs coupled with Battery Swap Stations (BEV-BSS), and HFCVs coupled with Hydrogen Refueling Stations (HFCV-HRS). The results suggest that BEV-CS has the lowest total system cost: its system cost is 62.5% and 90.3% of the costs in BEV-BSS and HFCV-HRS, respectively. BEV-BSS has the lowest delay time: its delay time is 62.1% and 86.0% of the delay times in BEV-CS and HFCV-HRS, respectively. HFCV-HRS has the lowest GHG emissions: its emissions are 37.3% and 46.9% of the emissions in BEV-CS and BEV-BSS, respectively. The results are expected to be helpful for policy making and infrastructure planning in promoting the development of alternative fuel vehicles.

Multiple Linear Regression Analysis of Canada’s Freight Transportation Framework

Background: Finding trends in freight transportation activities enables businesses and policy makers to build an understanding of freight transportation patterns and their impact on logistics planning when making investments in a region’s transportation infrastructure and intermodal freight transport system. To the best of our knowledge, there is limited literature and data-driven analysis about trends in transportation mode choices and the influencing factors in Atlantic Canada. Methods: In this study, a data-driven method has been used to analyze the Canadian Freight dataset to identify trends in transportation activities within Maritime, Canada. Freight transportation mode, product categories, distance, number/weight of shipments, and revenue were examined. Results: The results revealed that the top five product categories exported from Atlantic provinces to the rest of Canada, the US, and Mexico are miscellaneous items, food products, forest products, minerals, and other manufactured goods, where Truck for Hire is the most deployed mode of transportation. A multiple linear regression analysis indicated that the weight, distance, and number of shipments are positively and rather strongly correlated with revenue generation. Conclusions: This study provides a unique overview of Canadian Freight Analysis Framework (CFAF) data with a focus on maritime activities.

Alignment of port policy to the context of the Physical Internet

ABSTRACT The Physical Internet (PI) is a paradigm-changing and technology-driven vision, which is expected to significantly impact the development of the freight transport and logistics (FTL) system of today. However, the development of the FTL system towards the PI creates much uncertainty for its current stakeholders. Ports are one of those stakeholders that are expected to be profoundly affected by these developments. However, research that focuses on port policy, under the uncertain developments towards the PI, is still lacking. By providing port authorities with insights and recommendations on robust policy areas, we address this void in literature. We conduct a scenario analysis in combination with multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) to determine the importance of port performance indicators and policy areas in different scenarios. The most significant, uncertain, and orthogonal factors for the development of the PI are technological development and institutional development. We find that for a proper alignment with the PI vision, in three out of four scenarios, ports should prioritize the implementation of digital solutions and standards, as opposed to an infrastructure focused policy.

Keeping goods moving in the wake of a disaster: a qualitative study of intermodal transport

PurposeThis paper examines what facilitates the swift reconfiguration of freight movements across transport modes in the wake of a major disaster.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative research approach focussing on the New Zealand (NZ) domestic freight transport operations in the wake of the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake is used with data collected through 19 interviews with 27 informants. The interviews are thematically analysed by using the framework method.FindingsThe paper provides rich and detailed descriptions of the ability of a freight transport system to recover from a disaster through rapid modal shifts. This paper identifies nine factors enabling modular transport operations and highlights the critical role of physical, digital, operational and inter-organisational interconnectivity in the aftermath of a disaster.Originality/valueAlthough the management of freight disruptions has become a prevalent topic not only in industry and policy-making circles, but also in the academic literature, qualitative research focussing on the ability of commercial freight systems to adapt and recover from a disaster through rapid modal shifts is limited. This qualitative study sheds light on the mechanisms underlying the continuity of freight operations in the wake of a disaster and provides a comprehensive understanding of modular transport operations and the ability of freight systems to keep goods moving.

A multi-method approach to develop dynamic hypotheses for systemic challenges in the Swiss freight transport system

A multi-method approach to develop dynamic hypotheses for systemic challenges in the Swiss freight transport system