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The break-even distance of road and inland waterway freight transportation systems

Author

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  • Chunxia Lu

    (Department of International Shipping, School of Naval Architecture, Ocean & Civil Engineering, Shanghai Jiaotong University, 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200240, People’s Republic of China. E-mails: chunxialu@sjtu.edu.cn; yanxw1108@163.com)

  • Xiaowen Yan

    (Department of International Shipping, School of Naval Architecture, Ocean & Civil Engineering, Shanghai Jiaotong University, 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200240, People’s Republic of China. E-mails: chunxialu@sjtu.edu.cn; yanxw1108@163.com)

Abstract

Road transportation inevitably causes environmental problems such as air pollution, congestion and accidents. In contrast, inland waterway transportation is a cost-efficient and environmentally friendly alternative to road transportation. Cost is usually the most critical factor in selecting a mode of freight transportation. With a greater focus on the externalities of transportation systems, the European Commission advocates the idea that the impacts on society and the environment should be reflected by the costs of transportation. As a result, the full costs of a given transportation system should include both the internal and external costs. In this study, we develop a model for calculating the internal and external costs of road and inland waterway freight transportation systems and use the model to determine the break-even distance of the two systems. The model was applied to the Yangtze River Delta in China. Our key finding is that handling rates have a great effect on the break-even distance. In addition, the policy of internalisation of externalities clearly decreases the break-even distance and reduces the market share of road transportation.

Suggested Citation

  • Chunxia Lu & Xiaowen Yan, 2015. "The break-even distance of road and inland waterway freight transportation systems," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 17(2), pages 246-263, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:marecl:v:17:y:2015:i:2:p:246-263
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    Cited by:

    1. Florian Hofbauer & Lisa-Maria Putz, 2020. "External Costs in Inland Waterway Transport: An Analysis of External Cost Categories and Calculation Methods," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(14), pages 1-19, July.
    2. Furkan Oztanriseven & Heather Nachtmann, 2020. "Modeling dynamic behavior of navigable inland waterways," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 22(2), pages 173-195, June.
    3. Behzad Behdani & Bart Wiegmans & Violeta Roso & Hercules Haralambides, 2020. "Port-hinterland transport and logistics: emerging trends and frontier research," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 22(1), pages 1-25, March.
    4. Fazi, Stefano & Fransoo, Jan C. & Van Woensel, Tom & Dong, Jing-Xin, 2020. "A variant of the split vehicle routing problem with simultaneous deliveries and pickups for inland container shipping in dry-port based systems," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    5. Wenjie Li & Jialing Dai & Yi Xiao & Shengfa Yang & Chenpeng Song, 2021. "Estimating waterway freight demand at Three Gorges ship lock on Yangtze River by backpropagation neural network modeling," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 23(3), pages 495-521, September.

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