A Study on Structure of Regional Freight Generation in China

Abstract

The demand of freight generation in China has been rapidly increasing due to economic growth since 1978. The shortage of infrastructures such as roads, railways, ports, which is insufficient to support this increasing demand has been restraining further economic development in China. It is essential to forecast the future demand of freight generation in order to make an efficient transportation network. Freight generation forecasting models which usually follows passenger generation models are usually base on social, economic and freight statistics.

This paper aims to build freight generation models that estimate regional freight generation based upon economic conditions, industrial structures and the stock of transportation facilities. The analysis of this paper consists of three phases. First, simple regression models are built by using time-series data of the country and cross-section data of all regions. Second, a cluster analysis is applied to group regions from the viewpoint of freight generation. And third, multiple regression models are built by using regional statistics of economies, industries and the transportation infrastructures.