The participants in the grain logistics system need forecasts of railroad grain carloads. Although forecasting studies have been conducted for virtually every mode, no forecasting studies of quarterly railroad grain transportation have been published. The objectives of the paper are (1) specify a US quarterly railroad grain transportation forecasting model, and (2) empirically estimate the mode...

We describe competition over space between a competitive shipping industry (truck-barge) and one with market power (the railroad). The latter prices so as to "beat the competition" in equilibrium, or else at the monopoly price, if that is lower. The monopoly price rises more slowly than do the costs of transportation (freight absorption) if the spatial demand at each point is log-concave. With ...

Railroad transportation of hazardous materials did not receive as much attention as highway transportation in the academic literature, although comparable volumes are shipped via these two transport modes in North America and Europe. In this paper we present an optimization methodology for the railroad tactical planning problem with risk and cost objectives. We determine the routes to be utiliz...

Attractive train schedules are quite important for the success of public rail transport. We consider schedules which are repeated after some xed time period. Periodicity is a well accepted, convenient attribute of all major railroad systems. Since trains share the public railroad network, we have to handle many connicting demands. Increasing competition from transportation alternatives as well ...

The railroad industry was substantially deregulated by the Staggers Act in 1980. While railroad rates, as measured by industry-wide revenue per ton-mile, declined since that time, it is unclear why rates declined. Changes in commodity mix, length of haul, shipment size, lading weight, equipment ownership, railroad costs, competition from other modes, and demand for railroad transportation have ...

This paper proposes an ant colony optimization algorithm to assist railroad yard operational planning staff in their daily tasks. The proposed algorithm tries to minimize a multi-objective function that considers both fixed and variable transportation costs involved in moving railroad cars within the railroad yard area. This is accomplished by searching the best switch engine schedule for a giv...