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Development Status and Future Trends for Eurasian Container Land Bridge Transport

Author

Listed:
  • Olli-Pekka Hilmola

    (Kouvola Unit, LUT University, Tykkitie 1, FIN-45100 Kouvola, Finland
    Estonian Maritime Academy, Tallinn University of Technology (Taltech), Kopli 101, 11712 Tallinn, Estonia)

  • Weidong Li

    (School of Economics & Management, Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing 100044, China)

  • Yulia Panova

    (Department of E-Commerce, Luoyang Normal University, Luoyang 471934, China)

Abstract

For decades, trade between Europe and China has grown consistently, which has resulted in increased container transportation volumes. Such transportation has been dominated by sea-based options. However, over the years, an air-based mode of transport was developed, while it has lately become increasingly popular to use railways utilizing the Trans-Siberian land bridge. This latter approach boomed amid the COVID-19 crisis in 2020. However, the railway container boom in Eurasia has deeper roots than just the COVID-19 era. As is illustrated in this research work, international trade containers (trade between Russia and other countries, mostly China) and transit containers (e.g., serving the Chinese–EU route) were already showing some significance as early as 2003–2004. In 2020, their volume was already measured in the millions, regardless of the railway data source being used. This is well above the starting period in the 1980s and 1990s, when total annual volumes were around 0.1 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU). Container capacity has developed over the years, first being used for international trade and only lately for transit. As a preliminary comparison to air freight, the growth rate was roughly double that in the two-decade observation period.

Suggested Citation

  • Olli-Pekka Hilmola & Weidong Li & Yulia Panova, 2021. "Development Status and Future Trends for Eurasian Container Land Bridge Transport," Logistics, MDPI, vol. 5(1), pages 1-12, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jlogis:v:5:y:2021:i:1:p:18-:d:521669
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zhang, Xu & Zhang, Wei & Lee, Paul Tae-Woo, 2020. "Importance rankings of nodes in the China Railway Express network under the Belt and Road Initiative," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 134-147.
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    3. Olli-Pekka Hilmola, 2019. "The Sulphur Cap in Maritime Supply Chains," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-98545-9, February.
    4. Jiang, Yonglei & Sheu, Jiuh-Biing & Peng, Zixuan & Yu, Bin, 2018. "Hinterland patterns of China Railway (CR) express in China under the Belt and Road Initiative: A preliminary analysis," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 189-201.
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    Cited by:

    1. Jieyin Lyu & Fuli Zhou & Yandong He, 2023. "Digital Technique-Enabled Container Logistics Supply Chain Sustainability Achievement," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(22), pages 1-28, November.
    2. Olli-Pekka Hilmola & Weidong Li, 2023. "Drivers of railway container transports between China and Finland," Journal of Shipping and Trade, Springer, vol. 8(1), pages 1-19, December.

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