Port Cooperation and Bundling: A Way to Reduce the External Costs of Hinterland Transport

• Main Authors: Joost Hintjens, Edwin van Hassel, Thierry Vanelslander, Eddy Van de Voorde
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-11-01
• Series: Sustainability
• Subjects: seaport; cooperation; welfare effects; bundling; hinterland; TEN-T
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/23/9983

The present paper studies the bundling of road cargo flows of neighbouring seaports to a common hinterland. In specific cases, some hinterland flows can be too small to make bundling in a sufficient frequency possible. By combining the road freight flows of neighbouring ports, this problem can be solved. However, the additional cost of bundling and the loss of time need to be compensated for by a lower transport cost. The paper presents an empirical model for the 104 core Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) ports of the European Union (EU) and their 271 NUTS2 (Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics) hinterland regions that allows identifying opportunities for bundling as well as the direct and external cost effects. By including the value of time (VOT) of each transport mode, the generalised cost is also calculated. The result is a business model that helps port authorities, and other port actors, to identify bundling projects that will lower the direct, generalised and external costs of the hinterland connectivity, thus increasing the port attractiveness for port users as well as lowering potential aversion by the surrounding community to port operations that create hinterland nuisance.