Design and management of freight transport networks: intermodal transport and externalities

This is a summary of the author’s Ph.D. thesis supervised by Sabine Limbourg and defended on May 29, 2017 at the University of Liège, Belgium. The thesis is written in English and is available from the author upon request at martine.mostert@ulg.ac.be and from http://hdl.handle.net/2268/211640. This work develops new intermodal freight transport models which take into account the negative impacts of transport on its environment. A literature review on transport externalities and their valorization methods highlights the small number of studies related to the general modeling of transport externalities through dedicated mathematical formulas. However, the latter are important for identifying the key parameters that influence transport competitiveness in terms of externalities. This is demonstrated by analyzing two external cost functions for road and rail. The location of intermodal terminals, where the flow transfer between road and a more environmentally friendly mode occurs, stands out from the environmental perspective as one of the most important competitiveness factors of intermodal transport regarding road. An innovative mathematical model for the location of terminals and allocation of flows between road and intermodal rail and inland waterways (IWW) transport is developed. The model is based on a bi-objective formulation which evaluates the trade-offs between transport operational costs and CO2 emissions. Economies of scale of intermodal transport are integrated thanks to nonlinear functions. The model is applied to the Belgian network. Results indicate that terminal locations are relatively stable, whatever the optimized economic or environmental objective. The type of terminal located changes according to the followed strategy. Minimizing CO2 emissions leads to an increased use of intermodal transport. The impact of transport on air pollution is also evaluated. On the Belgian case, an economic optimization of transport operational costs is compared

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