Calls for papers

 

World Review of Intermodal Transportation Research

 

Special issue on: "Northern Dimension of European Logistics"

Guest Editors:
Dr. Ulla Tapaninen, University of Turku, Finland
Dr. Olli-Pekka Hilmola, Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland

Northern Europe covers the countries on the rim of Baltic Sea: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Denmark, Sweden and Finland. Norway is often included in the BSR as well as northwestern parts of Russian and the northern part of Germany. It is an area of high economic growth, e.g. economic growth of such countries as Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Russia have been well above double compared to European average.

In this special issue we are interested in these named countries, which form the main part of European Northern Dimension. This region is not only interesting because of its economic growth, but due to reason that this part of the Europe is the main border crossing point to Russia, and other eastern economies. The increase in Russian consumer demand is so strong, however, that the country's own ports will not be able to deal with the increasing imports. Also, trade flows are rather mixed: in some of the countries mentioned, a strong industrial base exists, while others rely on raw material trade and transports. For example, in the Baltic Sea nowadays, more than 200 million tons of oil is being transported by sea vessels. Currently, the amount of container transports is estimated to be above 4 million TEU. Also, in all of these countries, the railway and short sea transport market share from total transports is significantly higher than in the average European country.

We are interested in research works concerning the organisation of logistics in this region, investment issues, intermodality support, maritime, road and railway transport, information technology applications, and company case studies (e.g. third party logistics). Our prime focus, however, is on freight transport. Safety, security and environmental aspects may be addressed as well. Focus, in any paper, should be at least on one of the countries named above. Proposed research works should be forward looking, since transportation growth, e.g. concerning oil and containers, is estimated to continue showing high growth in the forthcoming decade.

Subject Coverage
Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following areas:

• Intermodal freight transports
• Infrastructure requirements and readiness in the region
• Container transports
• Warehousing solutions
• Information technology to support logistics flows
• Border-crossing issues
• Employment issues and transportation economics in the region
• Harbour development
• Privatisation issues
• Transportation corridors to the East
• Safety and security issues
• Environmental aspects of transport

Notes for Prospective Authors

Submitted papers should not have been previously published nor be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere

All papers are refereed through a peer review process. A guide for authors, sample copies and other relevant information for submitting papers are available on the Author Guidelines page

Important Dates

Full paper due: 30 June, 2008

Notification of acceptance: 31 September, 2008