Railway Reform: Toolkit for Improving Rail Sector Performance - ppiaf

Railway Reform: Toolkit for Improving Rail Sector Performance
2. Rail Markets and Technology
Double-stack Container Train
it is over 8,000 tons per person/hour at a typical container port. Typically, a
break-bulk ship that handles crates, barrels, and bags of miscellaneous freight,
would be in port for several weeks, and in 1959, a general commercial cargo vessel
could carry 10,000 tons of freight at a speed of 16 knots (29 kph). By 2009,
container ships could carry 77,000 tons at 25 knots (46 kph) and would be in port
for only 16 hours to unload and load. Some of these same efficiencies apply to rail
transport of general freight. Box wagons can hold more goods than a container
and are useful for many commodities, but they can be used only by shippers located
on rail lines. Other shippers must load goods into containers and use road
transport to move them to a container terminal where they are transferred to a
ship or train for transport over longer distances. In many markets, rail transport
competes fiercely with road transport for container shipments; most timesensitive
freight moves by road transport from origin to destination. However,
containerized rail transport is increasingly preferred to move general freight to
and from ports and distant inland logistics centers.
Rail freight services
are usually measured
in tons of freight, and
by net and gross tonkilometers.
Freight traffic on any mode is typically measured in tons and ton-kilometers. A
ton-kilometer = cargo weight transported X distance transported—also reported
as net ton-kilometers (NTK). Another frequently reported measure is revenue
ton-kilometers, which refers to revenue-producing freight tons and excludes non
revenue-producing freight such as rail, ballast, or other goods transported for
railway company use. For railways, an important measure of work performed is
gross ton-kilometers, this measure includes rail wagons’ empty weight for both
empty and loaded movements. This measure of gross ton-kilometers is also called
‘trailing tons’ or the total tons being hauled. Sometimes gross ton-kilometer
measures include the weight of locomotives used to haul freight trains.
Energy and fuel consumption in railways is closely related to gross-tonkilometers
since this is a nearly direct measure of work performed. Geography
plays an important role in energy consumption as well. Whether trains must be
hauled over a mountain range or rolled downhill has a direct effect on energy use
of any particular railway line. But, given the geography, energy consumption is
usually related to gross-ton-kilometers.
Railways are best at
moving high volumes
of passengers or
freight between
common points.
2.3 What Railways Do Best
Railways are an efficient and cost-effective means to transport large volumes of
passengers and freight over various distances, particularly between originating
and terminating points with large volumes. Rail transport cost effectiveness increases
as volumes and distances increase. When traffic demand involves smaller
passenger and freight volumes that must be distributed over a larger number of
points, road transport is usually more efficient and cost effective.
For high volumes, railways deliver much more significant cost savings, environmental,
energy, land use, and other social benefits than road transport, although
in some cases, rail can be slower. Water transport can be more energy efficient
and lower cost than rail transport, depending on waterway circuitry and availability,
but typically, water transport is much slower. Rail passenger and freight
transport are competitive with road and air transport at some distances.
The World Bank Page 17