How highly does the freight transport industry value journey time reliability—and for what reasons?

Abstract

Delays to road freight impose a high economic cost. Delayed arrival time can occur for various reasons. This paper presents findings of a study which investigated the user valuations of three kinds of delay: Delay resulting from an increased journey time, with fixed departure time An increase in the spread (or range) of arrival times for a fixed departure time Schedule delay, where the departure time is effectively put back. This paper summarises the findings of the study, which centred on an interview survey of forty shippers, hauliers and third party logistics operators. Respondents were asked to consider in detail one of their freight flows using trunk roads. Various reasons why respondents value high predictability of journey times on the trunk road network are identified and discussed. The paper then presents and discusses user valuations of each kind of delay, estimated using adaptive stated preference methodology.