Inland Water Transport in Poland

1. Introduction

The aim of this report is to present the reason of reducing the importance of inland water transport through the ages in Poland. In addition, possible solutions to improve the inland water transport in Poland. The report does not examine the methods of implementation in detail, but focuses on historical background, current situation and future aspects in general.

The means of transport are the fundamental components of economic infrastructure in every country. We can divide the transportation system to road, railway, pipeline, marine and inland waterways transport (excluding air transportation). After years of competition between the different systems of transport, there is now a tendency for their co-operation and complementarity. In this report I will focus on waterage transport in Poland.

Inland water transport includes natural modes as navigable rivers and artificial modes such as canals. Its advantages include low pollution and noise emission, low energy consumption, high durability of means of transport and infrastructure, large vessels cargo space and a small number of collisions.

At present, inland water transport in Poland has marginal importance. However, there are many projects to improve it and to cooperate with other modes of transport. In the report I will try to answer the questions what is the reason of low importance of inland water transport and how to improve it.  

2. Inland water transport in Poland

2.1 Historical Background

Inland water transport is one of the oldest ways to move people and goods. All ancient civilizations evolved and coexisted with the rivers. Rivers were natural centers along which focused on life of ancient civilizations. All the most significant civilizations developed by the rivers.

The first source of the existence of inland waterway connections