Mapping and evaluating the complexity of information flows in freight transport chains

Vasco Reis and Pedro Macedo

Transportation Planning and Technology, 2019, vol. 42, issue 8, 757-776

Abstract: The role of information in the efficient management of freight transport systems is well acknowledged. Administrative functions, such as negotiation or payments, involve intensive communication, while the production of the transport service relies heavily on the sharing of information (e.g. track and trace). Yet, specific literature on information flows is relatively scarce. This paper sets out to contribute to filling in this gap. Firstly, it elaborates a set of maps of the information flows for four conceptualisations – direct link, corridor, hub and spoke, and connected hubs – of maritime freight transport, initially proposed by Woxenius (2007, “Generic Framework for Transport Network Designs: Applications and Treatment in Intermodal Freight Transport Literature.” Transport Reviews 27 (6): 733–749. doi:10.1080/01441640701358796). The results reveal a high degree of similarity between import and export services. Secondly, it assesses the complexity of each conceptualisation’s flow network using the concept of entropy. Flows are characterised along four variables: involved agents, timing, and contents and message type. Additionally, a new taxonomy is proposed to categorise the messages. The results evidence the heterogeneous contributions of each category to the complexity of the flows. Finally, the results also reveal that the information flows for the tasks in the pre-transport stage are not specific to the conceptualisation in question and are of comparable complexity to the flows occurring during the transport stage.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/03081060.2019.1675312 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:transp:v:42:y:2019:i:8:p:757-776

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/GTPT20

DOI: 10.1080/03081060.2019.1675312

Access Statistics for this article

Transportation Planning and Technology is currently edited by Dr. David Gillingwater

More articles in Transportation Planning and Technology from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().