[sustran] Re: rail vs road freight distribution

Todd Alexander Litman litman at vtpi.org
Thu May 4 22:33:34 JST 2006


Rail is often the most cost effective way of shipping farm products. 
Here in North America many farm groups have fought hard to maintain 
rail service in their areas. For that reason some rural communities 
have purchased rail lines that were scheduled for abandonment in 
order to maintain service.

Researchers Kenneth Casavant and Jerry Lenzi ("Rail Line Abandonment 
and Public Acquisition Impacts on Economic Development," 
Transportation Research Record 1274, 1989, pp. 241-251) found that it 
is often cost effective for transportation agencies to subsidize rail 
lines than to have rural freight (such as farm products) travel by 
heavy trucks, which cause significant damage to roadways. An 
efficient transportation system would charge trucks the full costs of 
the road damage they impose, which would give shippers a rational 
reason to use rail when it is most cost effective overall, but 
currently most jurisdictions undercharge heavy trucks (i.e., they 
impose significant economic externalities) making trucking appear 
cheaper than it really is to society.

Of course, this is not to suggest that all freight should travel by 
rail, but with improved logistics (i.e., more containerization and 
more efficient terminal operations) and as fuel costs increase and 
communities become more concerned about external impacts such as road 
damage, congestion, accident risk and pollution, the role of rail increases.


Best wishes,
-Todd Litman


At 01:43 AM 5/4/2006, D. Scott TenBrink wrote:
>Todd makes the point that people are not randomly distributed, but
>clumped into
>urban areas.  However, farms are quite widely dispersed and supermarkets tend
>to be (somewhat) evenly distributed across an urban area.  Thus, it
>seems quite
>obvious why the farmer would choose to support road over rail, and I
>think that
>was the point of the original message.


Sincerely,
Todd Alexander Litman
Victoria Transport Policy Institute (www.vtpi.org)
litman at vtpi.org
Phone & Fax 250-360-1560
1250 Rudlin Street, Victoria, BC, V8V 3R7, CANADA
"Efficiency - Equity - Clarity"

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