Rail-Truck Multimodal Freight Collaboration: A Statistical Analysis of Freight Shipper Perspectives

Due to the effects of congestion and rising fuel costs, the need for green transportation and energy security, and the increasing revenue gaps to finance highway, there is a critical need for freight shippers to strengthen their business competitiveness by improving the reliability of their logistic system and reducing supply chain costs. Using a sample of 275 freight shippers operating in the United States (U.S.) Midwest region, this study explores opportunities and barriers for freight shippers in the U.S. to consider rail-truck multimodal freight carriers as a means of reaching future supply-chain objectives. A two-step modeling process involving cluster analysis and discrete response models are used to address the complexity of model structures involving inter-related factors that foster/impede freight shippers’ use of rail-truck multimodal freight carriers. The analysis suggests that a freight shipper’s primary mode of freight shipping, commodity unit value and its primary shipping range have a significant influence in fostering/impeding the use of rail-truck multimodal freight carriers. Other significant influences include shippers’ dependency on freight transportation, commodity unit value, primary shipping range, business size in terms of annual revenue, cargo containerization level, in-transit visibility expectation, and confidence in rail freight carrier performance. The results provide various insights that can be used to assist relevant decision-makers across rail carriers and truck carriers to efficiently design rail-truck multimodal freight service so that it can be customized to address the disparate needs/concerns of the different freight shipper market segments so as to foster the service widely among freight shippers.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AT045 Intermodal Freight Transport. Alternate title: Rail-Truck Multimodal Freight Collaboration: Statistical Analysis of Freight Shipper Perspectives
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Guo, Yuntao
  • Peeta, Srinivas
  • Mannering, Fred
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 94th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2015-1-11 to 2015-1-15
• Date: 2015

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: References; Tables;
• Pagination: 20p
• Monograph Title: TRB 94th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Carriers; Cooperation; Freight transportation; Multimodal transportation; Railroad transportation; Statistical analysis; Supply chain management; Trucking
• Geographic Terms: Midwestern States
• Subject Areas: Administration and Management; Economics; Freight Transportation; Motor Carriers; Railroads; I10: Economics and Administration;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01555166
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 15-1551
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Feb 26 2015 10:03AM