G A Giannopoulos

Inland Maritime Transport in Greece after the Lifting of the Cabotage and Full Liberalization: A Review. Part 1: The Situation ‘before’ and Expected Impacts

A comprehensive review of the inland maritime transport system of Greece before the application of full liberalization in the provision of transport services and the lifting of cabotage restrictions that existed until 2002 is presented. The review is made both in terms of the quantity of the demand and supply sides as well as in terms of the quality of the offered services. The paper also examines all the elements that affect the operation of the system in a way that lends itself to a comparison of the ‘before’ situation (presented here) with an ‘after’ situation, which will be evaluated in Part 2 of the paper after the relevant data are available once the new system has been in operation for a few years. The paper begins with a description of the fully liberalized system that was put in operation in November 2002, and the elements that have changed. It then gives a picture of the whole system (based on data for 1999–2001) in terms of: (1) passenger and freight flows and their temporal variations; (2) the characteristics of the fleet; (3) the characteristics of the port infrastructure; and (4) the levels of services offered (frequencies, travel times, reliability of travel times, congestion at ports, form of the network). Interviews were undertaken with experts working on the Greek inland maritime transport systems at either the operation of the services (shipping companies) or on its administration (ministries and supervising organizations), and the interviews were supplemented by past experience from other countries and the brief experience gained from the new system. The paper first gives an overview of the expected impacts and changes that will be realized with the new system. A brief description is given of a decision support tool created as part of a consultancy study to help the Ministry of Merchant Marine in the management and monitoring of the new liberalized system and taking decisions based on European Union legislation.

Implications of European transport telematics on advanced logistics and distribution

The emerging changes in the Organization and structure of industrial and commercial operations in Europe and the increasing application of advanced Telematics, is having a profound impact on Logistics. This paper examines the role that Telematics are playing in advanced Logistics and the factors that will influence the final outcome as regards new logistics concepts and services in Europe in the near future. First, a concise description of the basic Telematics applications is given with a reference to their content and potential benefits. Then the area of advanced Logistics is explored with reference to functions and hierarchies so that basic notions are defined. The impacts of Telematics on advanced Logistics are then examined and analyzed. These impacts are seen as filling in three main categories: a) Impacts towards greater logistics integration, i.e. systems of logistics support, that encompass many or even all levels of activities from manufacturing to transportation, and distribution. b) Impacts towards enabling the re-engineering of logistics processes and, most importantly, within the overall business process re-engineering. c) Impacts towards greater inter-company optimization and liaison with users, i.e. between suppliers and users or between transporters and shippers, etc. In the final section, the paper discusses the constraints that exist in the materialization of the above impacts, and the policy implications for European governments and the EU.

Investigation of Inland Freight Transport Modal Choice in Greece: Parameters and Attributes Influencing Freight Mode Choice

The process and criteria for freight modal choice behavior in Greece were investigated in research between 2004 and 2009. The work involved a large-scale survey of various freight transport actors in Greece; a full statistical analysis of the results and a presentation to determine priorities, preferences, and detailed rankings of mode choice criteria; and a modeling exercise to produce models that depict the mode choice behavior of Greek firms. This paper discusses the questionnaire survey, characteristics of the participating firms, the decision-making process used for choosing the mode of transport, and the criteria used for mode choice decision making in Greece. The results contain conclusions and data that can be used to describe mode choice behavior in freight transport not only in Greece but also in other countries. These are summarized as reliability and quality of transport services, transport cost, characteristics of the transport chain, and the prevailing governmental policy and its corresponding legal framework for operation of the transport market. A future paper will contain the results of the modeling exercise and the various models of freight mode choice behavior that were formed.

Definition of accessibility for railway stations and its impact on railway passenger demand

This paper addresses the notion of accessibility of railway stations and its relation to the number of passengers using these stations. It first gives a discussion on the notion of accessibility and it presents the special factors and the issues involved in its definition for (intercity) railway stations. Of the large number of possible definitions of an Accessibility Index, it goes on to choose the form that statistically explains better the changes in the number of passengers using a station. The methodology followed in order to do this, can be used as a guideline for determining the type of index that would best explain the data in other similar situations. Having selected an Accessibility Index for railway stations, a simple regression model has been made, that connects this accessibility index to the number of passengers using the station. The type of this relation, its statistical characteristics, and its sensitivity are then discussed and some useful overall conclusion reached. The data used and a first application of the results, which is also briefly described in the paper refer to the railway network of Greece.

The Business Value of Supply Chain Visibility and Monitoring

In recent decades, freight transport and supply chains have made sophisticated state-of-the-art applications of information and communication technologies that have made visible the whole transportation and supply chain and have increased the ability for collection, analysis, and use of data to improve performance. This approach involves both the demand side—data about items being sold, inventories, order, and receipt of goods—and the supply side—data about available capacities for packing, shipping, and transporting freight. Dynamic, reliable, and relevant information and data are essential to improving the whole freight transportation process through such factors as security information (e.g., theft, tampering), location and condition of cargo (e.g., temperature variations, humidity), and routing optimization. Technologies that make this information available to enterprises have several benefits, including the financial advantages of more efficient management of stock and supply chain operations. This paper identi-fies and quantifies these benefits according to research results based on the monitoring specific supply chains through the development and use of container monitoring devices. This quantification of benefits is possible because of specific practical tests and experience gained through field research at enterprises that apply the systems and through participation in international research projects funded under the European Unions Seventh Framework Programme.

European transport telematics and implications for the development of advanced logistics

There is an important transformation process in European freight transport operation and logistics at present. This process is driven by a number of influencing factors but primarily by: the advent of the Single European Market (SEM) and the restructuring of the manufacturing and distribution processes; and the influence of technological innovations, particularly in the field of telematics and their implications for what is generally called advanced logistics for freight and distribution. The effects on the transport sector of the Single European Market which is already in effect are soon to be evident and more widely felt, these are summarised in the paper.<<ETX>>

Some findings on the interaction between transport and land‐use in Greece

Using before and after studies in a number of urban areas in Greece, the authors examine the effect of investment in major transport infrastructure on land use. Major stimulation to growth was found in the secondary and tertiary economic sectors but no significant effect was found for housing development. Changes in land values tended to be concentrated at junctions. It was further observed that the impact of the transport investment took place almost entirely during the first ten years after project completion.

INTERMODAL FREIGHT TRANSPORT NETWORKS IN EUROPE AND POLICIES FOR THEIR DEVELOPMENT

Abstract In this paper we draw together some of the key findings concerning multimodal freight transport and Integrated Logistics services as key issues to the development of the European Multimodal network. In particular, we consider the relatively neglected issues of how freight logistics networks are developed and what market institutions and policy actions will be necessary in order to encourage optimal development of intermodal freight transport In so doing, we draw from experiences across a range of modal and inter-modal transport chains of today, and try to identify key policy implications.

Saturation flow and Capacity of shared lanes : Comparative evaluation of estimation methods

The operation of shared lanes, especially in the case of permitted phasing control, is still considered a complicated task and one for which many procedures and methods have been introduced. Dealt with here is the complexity when left- or right-turn movements or both are made during the unsaturated part of the opposing traffic flow. Three main methods used for estimating the shared lanes saturation flow rate and capacity values-that used in the 1985 Highway Capacity Manual (HCM) and the Australian Road Research Board (ARRB) and the Canadian methods-were analyzed and evaluated. The methodology for the comparative evaluation was based on two main approaches. In the first approach, example 1 of Chapter 9 of the HCM was used as a case study in which left through and left through right shared lanes exist in permitted phase control. In this case several computer runs were performed using the programs SIDRA and SINTRAL to estimate saturation flow and capacity values of the shared lanes opposed by different traf...

The influence of telecommunications on transport operations

The paper deals with the impact of telecommunications and information technology on the operation of transport systems in general. The interaction and cooperation of telecommunications with information technology and computers, is better known in Europe by the term ‘telematics’. The paper systematically examines the current applications of telematics in the operation and control of vehicles and traffic, and customer information and demand management. All modes of transport are examined but the main emphasis is on road and rail. The discussion combines the actual applications as well as their main results to date, with some critical appraisal of the success so far, and the prospects for future improvements. Then possible future developments in this field are discussed for road and rail, both passenger and freight. The outlook is not always bright and the problems and difficulties encountered are considered. The overall conclusion is that telematics in the field of transport operation has been applied for s...