GEOG 80 Transport Geography
Professor: Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Topic 3 – Transportation Modes
A. Characteristics
B. A Diversity of Modes
C. Intermodal Transportation
Hofstra University, Department of Global Studies & Geography
5. Air Transport
■ Context
• Air routes are practically unlimited, but several concentrations:
•
•
•
•
North Atlantic.
Inside North America and Europe.
Over the North Pacific.
Inside Asia.
• Multidimensional constraints:
• Site (a commercial plane needs about 3,300 meters of track for landing
and take off).
• Climate, fog and aerial currents.
• Air activities:
• Linked to the tertiary and quaternary sectors:
• Finance and tourism that require movements of people.
• Accommodating growing quantities of high value freight.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
World Air Travel and World Air Freight Carried,
1950-2008
4500
4000
160
Passengers
140
3500
120
3000
100
2500
80
2000
Billions of tons-km
Billions of passengers-km
Freight
60
1500
1000
500
0
40
20
0
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
5. Air Transport
■ Air Space
• Segment of the atmosphere that is under the jurisdiction of a
nation or under an international agreement for its use.
• Two major components:
• Land-based; takeoffs and landings.
• Air-based; composed of air corridors.
• Air corridors up to 12,500 meters.
• Limited to the use of predetermined corridors.
■ Air space use
• Air space exclusively belongs to the country under it.
• Access to the land and air-based components:
• Dependent on agreements between nations and airline companies.
• Air freedom rights.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Air Freedom Rights
First
Home
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
Seventh
Eight
Ninth
Country B
Country A
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
5. Air Transport
■ Short historical overview
• First paid passenger (1914):
• Between Tampa and St. Petersburg.
• Airfare of $10; $200 in today’s money.
• First commercial international service (1919):
• Between England and France.
• Airmail services:
• Very important in the initial years.
• Airplanes were of low carrying capacity.
• A source of income (e.g. US air postal routes).
• Threshold year (1956):
• More passengers were carried by air than by long distance (sleeper) rail.
• The end of long distance passenger rail and trans-oceanic liner services.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
US Post Office Airmail Routes, 1921
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Selected Transcontinental DC-3 Routes, Late
1930s
80% of all aircrafts were DC-3s (1941)
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Early Intercontinental Air Routes, 1930s
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
5. Air Transport
■ Development of air transportation after WWII
• Technical improvements:
• Jet engine considerably reduced distances (1958: Boeing 707).
• Greater speeds and improved ranges.
• Almost every part of the world can be serviced in less than 24 hours.
• Rising affluence:
• Linked with income and economic output growth.
• Disposable income available for leisure.
• International tourism and air transportation are mutually interdependent.
• Globalization:
• Trade networks established by multinational corporations.
• 4% measured by weight but more than 40% by value.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Shortest Air Route between London and Sydney,
1955 - 2006
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Main Commercial Passenger Aircraft, 1935-2008
Aircraft
Year of First Commercial
Service
Speed (km/hr)
Maximum Range at Full
Payload (km)
Seating Capacity
Douglas DC-3
1935
346
563
30
Douglas DC-7
1953
555
5,810
52
Boeing 707-100
1958
897
6,820
110
Boeing 727-100
1963
917
5,000
94
Boeing 747-100
1970
907
9,045
385
McDonnell Douglas DC-10
1971
908
7,415
260
Airbus A300
1974
847
3,420
269
Boeing 767-200
1982
954
5,855
216
Boeing 747-400
1989
939
13,444
416
Boeing 777-200ER
1995
1030
14,300
300
Airbus A340-500
2003
886
15,800
313
Airbus A380
2007
930
14,800
555
Boeing 787-8
2008
1040
15,700
250
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Development Costs for Selected Aircraft
Aircraft
Year of First
Service
Development Costs, Constant 2004
Dollars
Douglas DC-3
1935
4,300,000
Douglas DC-6
1946
144,000,000
Boeing 707
1958
1,300,000,000
Boeing 747
1970
3,700,000,000
Boeing 777
1995
7,000,000,000
Airbus A380
2007
14,400,000,000
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Trend in Aircraft Fuel Efficiency (Fuel burned per
Seat)
100
% of Base (Comet 4)
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
Year of Introduction
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Average Airfare (roundtrip) between New York
and London, 1946-2004 (in 2004 dollars)
$7,000
$6,500
$6,000
$5,000
$4,100
$4,000
$3,000
$2,600
$2,000
$1,000
$600
$0
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Number of Yearly Fatalities due to Air Transport
Crashes, 1918-2009
4,500
4,000
3,500
3,000
2,500
Deaths
Billions of passengers-km
Causes:
Human error (67%); Technical (20%); Weather (6%)
Occurrences:
Less than 10 km from an airport (54%)
Take off (21%) and Landing (50%)
2,000
1,500
1,000
0
1918
1920
1922
1924
1926
1928
1930
1932
1934
1936
1938
1940
1942
1944
1946
1948
1950
1952
1954
1956
1958
1960
1962
1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
500
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
New York / Hong Kong Air Routes: Conventional
and Polar
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Selected Ultra-Long-Range Nonstop Airline
Routes
From
To
Airline
Aircraft
Flying
Time
Distance
(km)
Singapore
New York
Singapore
Airbus A340-500
18:35
15,335
Singapore
Los Angeles
Singapore
Airbus A340-500
18:20
14,104
Bangkok
New York
Thai International
Airbus A340-500
17:30
13,950
New York
Hong Kong
Continental
Boeing 777-200ER/LR
16:00
12,952
Chicago
Hong Kong
United
Boeing 747-400
15:55
12,517
Toronto
Hong Kong
Air Canada
Airbus A340-500
15:30
12,550
Melbourne
Los Angeles
Qantas
Boeing 747-400
15:20
12,751
Karachi
Toronto
Pakistan
Boeing 777-200ER/LR
15:15
11,671
Atlanta
Johannesburg
South African
Boeing 747-400
15:05
13,575
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
5. Air Transport
■ Airline companies
• Around 900 airlines operating 11,600 commercial aircrafts.
• Highly capital intensive.
• Labor intensive, with limited room to lessen those labor
requirements.
• Average number of 200 seats per plane.
• Dominant share of the traffic is assumed by large passengers
and freight carriers.
• Many used to be state-owned.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
World’s 10 Largest Passengers and Freight
Airlines, 2007
Ryanair
Japan Airlines
Continental Airlines
All Nippon Airways
Air France
American Airlines
Lufthansa
United Airlines
Northwest Airlines
China Eastern Airlines
China Southern Airlines
Air China Limited
United Airlines
Northwest Airlines
Delta Air Lines
China Southern Airlines
American Airlines
United Parcel Service
Southwest Airlines
Federal Express
0
20,000
40,000
60,000
80,000
100,000
Thousands of Passengers
120,000
0
1,000 2,000 3,000 4,000 5,000 6,000 7,000 8,000 9,000 10,000
Million Tons
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Operating Expenses of the Airline Industry, 2004
Flight operations (fuel and pilots)
15%
Maintenance (parts and labor)
34%
5%
Aircraft and traffic servicing
Promotion and sales
7%
Passenger services
7%
Administration
8%
11%
15%
Equipment depreciation and amortisation
Transport related
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Market Share of World Airline Traffic, 2005
Oneworld
Aer Lingus, American Airlines, British Airways,
Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Iberia, LAN Airlines,
Qantas
KLM/Northwes
t
7%
SkyTeam
12%
Star
Adria Airways, Air Canada, Air New Zealand, All
Nippon Airlines, Asiana, Austrian, Blue1, bmi
british midland, Croatia Airlines, LOT Polish,
Lufthansa, SAS Scandinavian, Singapore, South
African, Thai Airways, Swiss, TAP Portugal,
Spanair, United, US Airways, Varig
Star
25%
Others
37%
Oneworld
19%
SkyTeam
Air France-KLM, Delta Airlines, Northwest,
Continental, Korean Air, Alitalia, Aeroflot,
Aeromexico, CSA Czech
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Strategies of Low-Cost Carriers
On-board
operations
Optimum use of seating space.
Minimal crew.
Limited and paying cabin service.
Aircraft
operations
Few (often one) types of aircraft used to minimize maintenance costs.
Stair boarding instead of air bridges.
Maximal usage of runway length (take-off thrust and braking on landing).
Fast turn around to maximize aircraft use.
No freight being carried.
Service network
Point-to-point services.
Destinations commonly of less than two hours apart.
Usage of secondary airports (lower gate rates).
Booking
Online booking to minimize transaction costs.
No travel agent commissions.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
5. Air Transport
■ Flows
• Massive:
• 1.4 billion passengers traveled by air transport (2000); 23% of the global
population.
• 2.8 billion departures and arrivals supported by airports.
• 900,000 people were airborne on scheduled flights somewhere in the
world at any one time.
• Air traffic is globally highly imbalanced:
• Distribution of the population.
• Unequal levels of development.
• Concentration of traffic in a limited number of hubs.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Major Air Traffic Flows Between Regions, 2000 (% of IATA
Scheduled Passengers)
North America
1.7
3.9
Europe
23.2
35.5
1.8
15.9
1.3
1.5
Middle East
Central America
1.3
South America
1.7
1.7
1.9
Asia
1.1
Africa
Southwest Pacific
3.2
2.6
80% of the global population lives in the Northern Hemisphere.
North America and Europe accounted for 70.4% of all passenger
movements in 2000.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
C – INTERMODAL TRANSPORTATION
1. Intermodalism
2. Containerization
3. Advantages and Challenges to Containerization
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Intermodalism: From Fragmentation to
Coordination
Factor
Cause
Consequence
Technology
Containerization & IT
Modal and intermodal innovations;
Tracking shipments and managing
fleets
Capital investments
Returns on investments
Highs costs and long amortization;
Improve utilization to lessen capital
costs
Alliances and M & A
Deregulation
Easier contractual agreements; joint
ownership
Commodity chains
Globalization
Coordination of transportation and
production (integrated demand)
Networks
Consolidation and
interconnection
Economies of scale, efficiency and
control.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Intermodal Transport Chain
Composition
‘Last mile’
Interchange
Transfer
‘First mile’
Local / Regional Distribution
Decomposition
National / International Distribution
Transport Terminal
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Multimodal and Intermodal Transportation
Multimodal Point-to-Point Network
Intermodal Integrated Network
C
A
C
A
B
B
Transshipment
Rail
Road
D
D
Transshipment
F
E
F
E
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Intermodal Transportation Cost Function
C(T)
Local / Regional Distribution Cost
Decomposition
C(dc)
Connection
C(cn)
Costs
National / International Distribution Cost
C(I)
Interchange
C(cn)
Connection
Composition C(cp)
Origin
Transshipment
Destination
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Cumulative Cost and Time of Moving a 40 Foot Container
between the American East Coast and Western Europe
3,500
Cumulative cost (US$)
3,000
2,500
2,000
1,500
1,000
500
0
0
100
200
300
400
500
Cumulative time (hours)
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
2. Containerization
■ Container
•
•
•
•
•
Load unit that can be used by several transport modes.
Usable by maritime, railway and road modes.
Rectangular shape that can easily be handled.
Reference size is the Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit (TEU).
Two major reference sizes:
• The 40 footer; most common (57%). Comes also in a “high-cube”
configuration (33%). Mainly used for retail goods.
• The 20 footer (27%). Mainly used for commodities.
• The “reefer” (6%). Used to transport temperature-sensitive goods.
• Life expectancy of 10-15 years.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Carrying Capacity of Containers (in cubic feet)
53 feet truck
4,090
53 feet hi-cube container
3,955
53 feet standard container
3,830
48 feet standard container
3,471
45 feet standard container
3,026
40 feet hi-cube container
2,690
40 feet standard container
2,385
20 feet standard container
1,169
0
1,000
2,000
3,000
4,000
5,000
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Number of Units and Weight of Standard Consumption Goods
that Can be Carried by a 20 Foot Container
4,648
Pair of shoes
Payload Weight (kg)
6,029
Units
3,916
DVD player
1,654
8,279
Cell phone
12,193
20,388
Copying paper
1,685
0
5,000
10,000
15,000
20,000
25,000
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Stacked 40-Foot Containers, Port of Yantian,
China
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
World Container Traffic, 1980-2008
500
World Traffic
World Throughput
Full Containers
Million TEU
400
Transshipment
Empty Containers
300
200
100
0
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Advantages of Containerization
Factor
Advantage
Standard transport
product
Can be manipulated anywhere in the world (ISO standard).
Specialized ships, trucks and wagons.
Flexibility of usage
Raw materials (coal, wheat), manufactured goods, cars, frozen products.
Liquids (oil and chemical products) and “reefers” (50% of all refrigerated cargo).
Reuse of discarded containers.
Management
Unique identification number and a size type code.
Transport management not in terms of loads, but in terms of unit.
Costs
Low transport costs; 20 times less than bulk transport.
Speed
Transshipment operations are minimal and rapid.
Port turnaround times reduced from 3 weeks to about 24 hours.
Containerships are faster than regular freighter ships.
Warehousing
Its own warehouse; Simpler and less expensive packaging.
Stacking capacity on ships, trains (doublestacking) and on the ground.
Security
Contents of the container is unknown to shippers.
Can only be opened at the origin, at customs and at the destination.
Reduced spoilage and losses (theft).
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
20-Foot Container on Truck
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
40-Foot Containers Doublestacked on a Rail Car
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
20-Foot Tank Containers
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
40’ Reefer
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
The Ultimate “Kegger”
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Reuse of a Discarded Container (South Africa)
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue
Challenges of Containerization
Factor
Challenge
Site constraints
Large consumption of terminal space; move to urban periphery.
Draft issues with larger containerships.
Infrastructure
costs
Container handling infrastructures (giant cranes, warehousing facilities, inland road,
rail access), are important investments.
Stacking
Complexity of arrangement of containers, both on the ground and on modes
(containerships and double-stack trains).
Loaded to avoid any restacking.
Management
logistics
Requires management and tracking of every container.
Recording, (re)positioning and ordering of containers.
Empty movements
Many containers are moved empty (20% of all flows).
Either full or empty, a container takes the same amount of space.
Divergence between production and consumption; repositioning.
Illicit trade
Common instrument used in the illicit trade of drug and weapons, as well as for illegal
immigration.
Worries about the usage of containers for terrorism.
© Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue