Intermodal Transportation

Abstract

What is intermodal transportation? This paper is about how intermodal transportation has been an important part in transportation industry. How does intermodal transportation work? Advantages and disadvantages of intermodal transportation in today’s transportation industry. Containerization is playing a big part in maritime industry. Why is it important to have containerization? Types of containers and sizes. How has containerization improved transportation?

Intermodal Transportation

The term intermodal transportation, or intermodalism, refers to the use of coordinated transportation of cargo on single trip. Air, inland water, pipeline, ocean carriers, railroads, and trucking companies cooperate and interact in the movement of standardized units (containers and trailers) for increased efficiency of their operations, increased use of infrastructure, and to provide better service and more choices for their customers. Although transportation through air is possible the price is costly. Intermodal transportation lowers down a lot of price by using each mode on the portion of the trip to which it is best suited. Example a truck moves an empty container to the shipper. The shipper loads the container with goods. The truck transports the loaded container to port. At the port, the container is loaded onto the steamship, which is forwarded to the port of destination. The container is driven to the warehouse of the receiver shortly after being discharged at the port of destination

Intermodal transportation as known today first gained currency in the 1960s when the use of trailer sized containers began transforming the way freight is packed and loaded on trucks and ships. Cargoes had of course been transferred through different type of modes long before the introduction of modern containers. Each of the transportation modes has gone through technological evolution and has functioned separately under a modally based regulatory structure for