Topic 12 (free topic) : Advantages and Disadvantages for Air Transportation

Air transportation is transportation by air. Besides that, the goods and passengers can be transported from one place to another by means of planes, helicopters and other flying machines. Air transportation has been developing at a very quick pace since the beginning of the 20th Century. Nowadays, almost every one can fly. Most of companies use the transportation because the transportation can manage the inventory and reduce the cost and the time for one shipment of the goods and services. The company can get the good customer services and the product can get a lot of customer demand. The transport of goods through airways is costly and therefore it is designated to carry costly goods of small quantity. 

They have advantages for use the air transportation is one of the biggest advantages to air transport is speed because the fastest mode of transport and therefore suitable carriage of goods over a long distance requiring less time. There is no substitute for air transport when the transport of goods is required urgently. Second, security and high safety is the arrival of product in the same condition they were in when to transfer to the carrier. Third, punctuality is the goods can transit based on the time and the air transportation can provides comfortable, efficient and quick transport service. It is regarded as best mode of transport for transporting perishable goods.Disadvantages for the air transportation are high costs. 

Air transportation is high cost between other modes of transportation. Second, the air transportation not provides door to door services. The product can get the high risk and can get the damage because maybe the customer can get wrong condition. Third, high maintenance because requires trained, experienced and skilled personnel which involves a substantial investment. The air transportation is controlled by weather condition. It is seriously affected by adverse weather conditions. Snow and heavy rain weather may cause cancellation of some flights. The transportation is most risky between other modes of transport because a minor accident may put a substantial loss to the goods, passengers and the crew. The chances of accidents are greater in comparison to other modes of transport.

Topic 11 (free topic) : Several Advantages for Rail Transportation

Railway transport has several advantages over other means of passenger/goods transportation, including safety, speed, capacity, comfort, environmental protection, traffic jam reduction, and economic feasibility.

Why safety? It’s because Railway accident averages and related injuries and deaths are much lower than those of other means of transportation such as motor vehicles. About speed the average time needed to transport people or materials from one point to another by railway has become quite competitive with other means of transportation, and is being continuously improved by increasing train speeds, reducing the length of their routes.

The capacity is also one of the advantages its mean that trains are capable of carrying larger number of passengers and greater volumes of goods that other means of transportation cannot handle. For the comfort is trains offer passengers more comfort and freedom of movement inside the trains’ cars.

Furthermore the main point is environmental protection to train are considered one of the most energy-efficient means of transportation. To transport one passenger one kilometre, a car needs twice to five times the energy consumed by a train. This average increases from four to eight times in the case of an aircraft.

For the traffic jam Utilizing trains to convey such big numbers of passengers and high volumes of goods means less cars and trucks on the roads, i.e., less accidents, less pollution and less time wasted. Based on the above benefits, railway transportation reduces the cost of transporting passengers and materials as well as road maintenance costs.

Topic 10 : 21st Century Rail Transportation Development and equipment

Although railways are a product of the industrial revolution, they has been affected by continuous innovations, technical, regulatory and commercial changes which have improved their capacity and efficiency. Rail transportation is thus as important in the 21st century as it was in the late 19th century. One innovation relates to the quality of the rail infrastructure, particularly rail tracks (e.g. better steel, concrete ties), which will determine the operational characteristics of their use such as speed, permitted weight, maintenance and resilience to the environment.

 Increasing electrification and automation will also improve the efficiency of rail transportation, passenger and freight alike. A few new rail lines are being built, but mainly in developing countries. Railway speed records have constantly improved with the introduction of high speed rail systems. For instance, portions of the French high speed rail system (also known as TGV: Tres Grande Vitesse) can reach speeds up to 515 km/hr. Variable wheel-base axles permit rail transport between different gauges. However, freight trains run at a considerably lower speed, in the range of 30-35 km/hr. In some cases, as the rail system gets more used, operational speed may decline because of congestion.

The emergence of high-speed rail networks and increasing rail speed had significant impacts on passengers transportation, especially in Europe and Japan (high speed freight trains are not currently being considered; see Application 1 for a more detailed overview). For instance, the French TGV has an operational speed of about 300 km/h. High-speed passenger trains require special lines, but can also use the existing lines at a lower speed. In many cases it permitted a separation between rail passenger traffic rolling at high speed and freight traffic using the conventional rail network. The efficiency of both the passengers and freight rail network was thus improved significantly.

 Since high-speed trains require some time to accelerate and decelerate, the average distance between stations has increased significantly, by-passing several centers of less importance. Over average distances, they have proved to be able to compete effectively with air transportation. Other strategies include improving the speed of existing passenger services without building a high speed corridor. This involves upgrading the equipment and improving the infrastructure at specific locations along the corridor. The benefits of offering a passenger rail service about 120 km/h can be substantial to improve the quality and efficiency of inter-city services in high density urban regions.

Topic 9 (free topic) : Maritime Issues

Seventy percent of Malaysia’s trade in manufactured goods is carried by containers and the use of containerized shipping has increased tremendously. During the 1990s, total container movements increased at least nearly 10 percent a year, with the fastest growth occurring in the ports of Malaysia.

                The rapid growth in container usage represents both a revolution in maritime technology and a significant logistics challenge to economies in the region. Though container ports in the region are becoming more efficient in handling containers Malaysia cannot keep pace with the rapidly growing demand for berth and storage space. While the capacity of the container fleet on the South East Asia – East Asia routes increased at more than 20 percent a year between 1980 and 2000, the capacity of container berths to handle those ships increased at less than 8 percent a year.

 Countries in the region, including Malaysia, responded to the shortage by adding new berths, converting general cargo berths to container handling and developing new ports. Expanded capacity requires greater land area for use in container storage and storage yards to handle the capacity still cannot cope with the decreasing amount of space available both at the ports and depots. Not to mention the means of transporting the containers across land.

There is limited scope for further reducing costs by increasing vessel size and the next development is likely to be more direct services from what are now feeder ports. With higher volumes and more efficient smaller vessels, this could overcome the cost penalty of transfers in the hub ports. The start of this trend can already be seen in the slower growth rates of two regional mega ports in this region: Port Klang and Port of Singapore.

Topic 8 : Factor in Determining Terminal Location

The terminal location is the related with to the decision of how many terminals to establish is the decision of where to establish them. They based on geographic, government and demand variables. The location must be to refer from the economic activities based on one location. The fundamentally based on geographical concepts of the site and based on situation. The site relates to the characteristics of a specific location while the situation concerns the relationships of a location in relation to other locations. 

Besides that, specific sites suitable for defense or commerce have been important factors in the location of cities. In addition to being a factor of spatial organization, transportation is linked with the location of economic activities, including retail, manufacturing and services. In a market economy, location is the outcome of a constrained choice where many issues are being considered, transportation being one of them. The goal is to find a suitable location that would maximize the economic returns for this activity. There is a long tradition within economic geography in developing location with a view to explain and predict the effect of economic activities by incorporating market, institutional and behavioral considerations.

The majority of location theories have an explicit or implicit role attributed to transport since accessibility is an important factor in the location preferences of firms and individuals. As there are no absolute rules dictating location choices, the importance of transport can only be evaluated with varying degrees of accuracy. The example for location terminal is ports and airport, roads and railroads and telecommunication.First about ports and airport are convergence of related activities around terminals, particularly for ports since inland and the cost being too high.

 The location and level of activity of ports and airports are reflective of global patterns. For example the airport and ports in Malaysia is Senai International Airport and Ports Klang. Second about roads and railroads, a structuring and convergence effect the varies according to the level accessibility. For the rail transportation the terminal also have a convergence effect. Last example for location terminal so telecommunications they no specific local influence but the quality of regional and national telecommunication system tends to ease transactions.