The Waterways Journal
25 June 2007
By Carlo J. Salzano, WJ Washington Correspondent
Washington, D.C. — James McCarville, executive director of the Port of Pittsburgh Commission, says the commission's website, www.portpittsburgh.pa.us, has available "Inland Waterways and the Global Supply Chain," a report resulting from the SmartRivers 2006 International Conference held last November in Brussels, Belgium.
SmartRivers is a cooperative effort designed to share information, ideas and technologies among inland waterway transportation officials, industry leaders and operators. The SmartRivers report compares the role of inland waterways markets, technologies and policies in the United States and the European Union.
"While the U.S. (waterway) system moves much greater volumes of goods on its river system, European policies encourage the movement of higher value goods, especially containers," McCarville said. "It is a different way of looking at waterways. In Europe, waterways are looked upon much more as a solution to problems of traffic pollution and congestion."
According to McCarville, the report documents how the European Union converts the "social benefits" of waterway transportation, such as roadway congestion-mitigation and pollution-reduction, and targets them into market-based subsidies to encourage modal shifts. He said it also provides a case study of how "via donau," Austria's inland waterway development agency, uses modern technology to enhance the use and development of its waterway system.
Among the conclusions reached in the report is that the most successful container-on-barge operations in Europe occur along waterway corridors that connect major international gateway ports to large inland industrial markets.
"The Mississippi River system that feeds the entire United States heartland through its extensive network of tributaries serves a similar industrial base," the report concluded. "The development of one or more international gateway container ports is needed to further enhance the suitability of this waterway system for COB development."