Freight Transport Analysis: Models, Challenges and Future Trends

This report delves into the multifaceted role of freight transport in economic and social development, emphasizing its impact on urban centers and geographical specialization. It explores various freight models, including zonal trip, trend and time series, and input-output models, while also acknowledging their strengths and weaknesses. The report identifies future challenges such as evolving customer expectations, technological advancements, and market dynamics. Furthermore, it highlights challenges faced by the freight transport industry, including supply chain security, sustainability concerns, and governmental regulations. A practical case study on water freight in the UK illustrates these challenges, particularly in land-use planning and infrastructure development. The report concludes by underscoring the crucial role of freight transport in trade and the exchange of goods and services, emphasizing the need for efficient and effective transportation systems.

Freight Transport 1
Student Name
University
Course
Unit
Date

Freight Transport 2
Executive summary
Transportation is crucial service that a society cannot do without it. It displays close
relationship to the life of the people, the location and range of economical actions and the
goods and services that are avail for consumption. The advancement that has been realised in
the transportation sector has change the way of life of people and the manner in which most
of the societies are structured and has therefore has got great influence towards civilization.
The purpose of writing this report is to explain the roles that is played by transport,
challenges that are faced by freight transport and the forecast of the future freight transport.
The paper will also give a practical case that will illuminate challenges that are faced by
freight transport and discussion on how this challenges can be addressed using the course
theories.

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Table of Contents
2.0 Introduction..........................................................................................................................3
3.0 Role plays by Freight transport in society and economic development...............................3
3.1 Social role of freight transport.............................................................................................3
Formation of settlements....................................................................................................3
Patterns and size of settlements..........................................................................................3
Growth and development of urban centres.........................................................................4
3.2 Economic role of transportation.......................................................................................4
4.0 Freight models used today...................................................................................................5
5.0 Future challenges in modelling Freight transport................................................................6
6.0 Challenges and future of freight transport...........................................................................7
7.0 Practical case that illuminate challenges faced by freight transport....................................7
8.0 Conclusions..........................................................................................................................8
9.0 References............................................................................................................................9

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2.0 Introduction
Freight transport is the process of transporting goods and merchandise commodities and
cargo. The word shipping referrers to transportation of goods by either sea, land or air.
Ground or land shipping can be done by the use of truck or by train. Shipping done by air is
through the use of aircraft, air freight is fastest mode of transport and it is suitable for long-
distance transportation and for perishable goods (Qu, Bektaş, Bennell, 2016).
3.0 Role plays by Freight transport in society and economic development
3.1 Social role of freight transport
Freight transport has played a crucial role in influencing the growth and development of
urban societies. Although other facilities for instance the availability of water and food,
played an important role, the contribution that has been brought out by transportation can be
clearly seen from the pattern, size, formation and development of current societies, more so
to the urban centres (Schliwa, Armitage, Aziz, Evans & Rhoades, 2015).
Formation of settlements
Since the initiation of civilization, man has been settling in areas that exited around the banks
of rivers junctions, trade routes or a port. Cities such as Moscow, Mumbai and New York are
the example.
Patterns and size of settlements
Settlements in the past had relatively small advancements, they developed and grew into
large cities and become main trade centres. The settlements’ size cannot be limited only by
the area size but it can also be influence by personal travels more so to and fro the work
place. The reduction of cost of transport and increase in the transportation speed have led to
the many spatial patterns.

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Growth and development of urban centres
When towns grow beyond working distance, the technology in transport sector plays an
important role in the formation of urban centres. For instance several cities that exist in plains
grew as a circular town with radial routes and the cities that exited along the rivers grew
linearly. The growth and development of auto miles and many other factors such as the
construction of road network and the increase in income led to the transformation of the
settlements into urban centres (Zamparini & Reggiani, 2016).
3.2 Economic role of transportation
An efficient freight transport system with modern improvements positively enhances
economical changes. The main impacts of freight transport on the economy can be grouped
as follows:
Geographic specialization- the advancement of freight transportation favours geographical
specialization. A commercial entity may produce goods or services with a good combination
of capital, work force and raw materials. An organization on a certain region may thus tend to
concentrate on creation of goods or services for which it will generate more than other region
provided that efficient freight transport system is available.
Large volume of production
An effective and efficient freight transport which offers cost effective, timely and reliability
merits enables the transportation of goods over a long distances. This helps in facilitating
mass production of goods by economies of scale since large markets can be easily accessed.
The ‘just-in-time’ concept in supply chain has expanded the productivity of creation and
transportation with benefits like low inventory levels and good responses to shift in the
products market condition. Therefore the more the more efficient freight transport becomes,

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the wider the market that can be supplied and the larger volume of production (Teoh, Kunze,
Teo & Wong, 2018).
Increase in the value of the land
Land that is located close to a good transport facility generally has got higher value because
of the utility it gives to various activities. Consumers may gain access variety of services and
goods while the people who reside near the facility will better access to services, employment
and social networks, all this contribute to the rise of the value of land.
4.0 Freight models used today
The following are the four models that has been put in practice
 Zonal trip models
 Trend and time series models.
 Systems dynamics
 Input-output and other related models.
The production and attractional of zonal trip models are typically derived by classification of
cross-sectional data on the transportation volumes to and from in area that is under
investigation.
In the trend and time series model, all the historic trends are inferred in to the future. The data
of the times have been utilized to create models for variety of level of sophistication that
range from a simple development factor model to a comprehensive auto-regressive moving
models (Navarro, Roca, Furió, Estrada,2016).
Input and output models are macro-economic replicas that originate from input-output tables.
According to ASTRA, the model for system dynamics that was developed for European
communication, the variation in transportation with time and the feedback to and from the

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economy, the environment and the use of land are modelled clearly (McLeod, Schapper,
JCurtis & Graham, 2019).
Strengths and weakness Freight Transport and attraction model
Type of model Strengths Weakness
System dynamics Low data requirements There is no any statistical
on the parameter values
Trip rate Requires limited data There is minimal insight
into interconnection and it
has a limited policy effects
scope.
Time series Limited data needs
Policy effects and external
variation may be
included.
There is minimal insight
into interconnection and it
has a limited policy effects
scope.
Input-output model It is linked to the
economy
May
It requires input and
output table
There is need for the
Identification of trade
flows of in port and export
There is need to convert
values to tonnes

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5.0 Future challenges in modelling Freight transport
The following are the challenges that will face future freight transport modelling
 Customer expectations – customer expectation are changing with time, individuals
and business will always expect to get faster and more flexibly.
 New technological advancement - Technology always change with time on how
logistics organization operates, this may make the existing models to be inefficient to
use in future.
 Market entrance- technological platforms have led to the rise and development of
new business models, this business models affects business in the sector of new
technology. The industry current supplies and customers may entering the market.
6.0 Challenges and future of freight transport
Freight transport face many challenges. The following are the most significant problems
facing the industry
 Increase in the demand to attain security initiatives of the supply chain
 There is constant increase in the need to address sustainability and environmental
issues.
 Addressing the concerns relating challenges of infrastructure and how it affects
logistics operations.
 The industry is facing complicated governmental legislations that influence business
operations negatively.

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7.0 Practical case that illuminate challenges faced by freight transport
Although the international shipping is undergoing the worst recession ever, with the variety
of ships being laid up and the cost of hiring a freight is becoming cheap, the challenges that
are faced by water freight are the worst (Vierth et al. 2017
Water freight in the UK overs three benefits to the country over road transport: The reduction
of fuel consumption, reduced congestion on roads and minimise carbon emission.
Nevertheless, it is being given a low profile than road and rails (Russo & Comi, 2016).
Another problem is the land-use planning. Various interests which is complete for utilization
on the commercial waterways and the developed coast, more so for residential development.
The land that is required for warehouse is lost to a house that could have been built
elsewhere.
For a freight in water to be successful there is need to build vibrant large ports with huge
freight generators that is located within hinterlands and should also be serviced effectively
and efficiently by rail and rings (Akgün & Monios, 2018).
8.0 Conclusions
Freight transport is very crucial in today economy, it facilitates travel trade and exchange of
goods and services. Without effective and efficient transportation regions could have been
highly isolated to each other.
Road transport and water have a very significant impact on trade and the use of ships play an
important role in transporting large volume of goods. The invention of several models of
freight transport has enhance modern business operations.

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9.0 References
Akgün, E.Z. and Monios, J., 2018. Institutional influences on the development of urban
freight transport policies by local authorities. In Advances in Transport Policy and
Planning (Vol. 1, pp. 169-195). Academic Press.
McLeod, S., Schapper, J.H., Curtis, C. and Graham, G., 2019. Conceptualizing freight
generation for transport and land use planning: A review and synthesis of the
literature. Transport Policy, 74, pp.24-34.
Navarro, C., Roca-Riu, M., Furió, S. and Estrada, M., 2016. Designing new models for
energy efficiency in urban freight transport for smart cities and its application to the Spanish
case. Transportation Research Procedia, 12, pp.314-324.
Qu, Y., Bektaş, T. and Bennell, J., 2016. Sustainability SI: multimode multicommodity
network design model for intermodal freight transportation with transfer and emission
costs. Networks and Spatial Economics, 16(1), pp.303-329.
Russo, F. and Comi, A., 2016. Urban freight transport planning towards green goals:
synthetic environmental evidence from tested results. Sustainability, 8(4), p.381.
Schliwa, G., Armitage, R., Aziz, S., Evans, J. and Rhoades, J., 2015. Sustainable city
logistics—Making cargo cycles viable for urban freight transport. Research in
Transportation Business & Management, 15, pp.50-57.
Teoh, T., Kunze, O., Teo, C.C. and Wong, Y., 2018. Decarbonisation of urban freight
transport using electric vehicles and opportunity charging. Sustainability, 10(9), p.3258.

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Vierth, I., Lindgren, S., de Jong, G., Baak, J., Hovi, I.B., Berglund, M. and Edwards, H.,
2017. Recommendation for a new commodity classification for the national freight model
Samgods (No. 2017: 11). CTS-Centre for Transport Studies Stockholm (KTH and VTI).
Zamparini, L. and Reggiani, A., 2016. The value of travel time in passenger and freight
transport: an overview. In Policy analysis of transport networks (pp. 161-178). Routledge.