NDSU staff members and graduate students made research presentations at the 56th Annual Transportation Research Forum, March 12-14, in Atlanta. 

EunSu Lee, an associate research fellow with NDSU’s Upper Great Plains Transportation Institute presented “Feedstock Import Options Regarding Transportation Systems for Asphalt Production.” He examined the logistics and distribution channels for importing heavy crude oil, a source of bitumen for asphalt production. Raj Bridgelall, a researcher with institute, is a cowriter.

The following doctoral students in NDSU’s Transportation and Logistics Program also presented.

Yong Shin Park presented “Assessing the Ecosystem Goods and Service of U.S Modal Freight: Supply Chain Linked Cradle-to-Gate Ecological Based Life Cycle Model.” Park developed a model to assess the ecosystem impact of U.S modal freight of the industrial sector using ecological based life cycle assessment. His cowriter is Gokhan Egilmez, assistant professor of industrial and manufacturing engineering at NDSU.

Jaesung Choi presented two posters and two papers. “Effects of the Rise in Oil Price on Ethanol Fuel Consumption in the U.S. Transportation Sector,” focuses on ethanol fuel production and oil price elasticity of ethanol fuel consumption in 14 states. The cowriter is David C. Roberts, assistant professor of agribusiness and applied economics at NDSU.

In “Effects of Air Pollution on the Productivity Growth in the Air and Truck Transportation Industries in the U.S.: An Application of the DEA Malmquist Environmental Productivity Index,” Choi examined the effects of air pollution on productivity growth in the air and truck transportation industries. Roberts also cowrote the poster.

Choi’s first paper was “Productivity Growth in the Transportation Industries in the United States: An Application of the DEA Malmquist Productivity Index”. Choi examined productivity growth in the U.S. airline, truck, rail, pipeline and waterway transportation industries. Roberts and Lee are cowriters.

Choi’s second paper, “Forecast of CO2 Emissions from the U.S. Transportation Sector: Estimation from a Double Exponential Smoothing Model” focused on whether the decrease in U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from the transportation sector will be consistent across all states from 2012 to 2021. Roberts and Lee were cowriters.

N. Muhammad Aslaam Mohamed Abudul (Nick) Ghani presented “Eco-efficiency of U.S. Container Ports Using Data Envelope Analysis.” The paper presents an analysis of the eco-efficiency of U.S. container ports. Cowriters were Lee and Park.

Elvis Ndembe presented two papers. In “Marketing Hard Red Spring Wheat in Shuttle Trains: Railroad Pricing in a Seemingly Captive Market,” he assessed the benefits of using shuttle trains relative to other rail services for shipping hard red spring wheat from North Dakota.

In “Estimating the Technical (TE) and Allocative Efficiency (AE) of the U.S. Class I Railroad: A Data Envelopment Analysis,” Ndembe examined the efficiency of the U.S. rail industry between 1997 and 2011.

Fesseha Gebremikael presented, “U.S Freight Transportation Eco-efficiency Performance Measure and Benchmarking State by State.” In the poster, he assessed the direct and indirect environmental impact of 33 U.S. food manufacturing sectors’ modal freight activity. Park is a cowriter.

Zijian Zheng presented “Heavy Vehicle Impact on Rural Two-Lane Highway Segments Operating Under Various Levels of Service Conditions.” His research to calculate passenger car equivalent impacts of heavy vehicles, such as oil trucks, on two-lane rural highways uses an improved analytical method based on headway and delay. Upper Great Plains Transportation Institute researcher Pan Lu was a cowriter.

Eileen (Anne) Campbell presented “Capital Investment Needs of the Small Railroads.” She examined the capital investment needs of the Class II and Class III railroads in the United States. NDSU associate professor of management and marketing Rodney Traub was a cowriter.

Jared Annexstad presented “Airport Congestion Mitigation: An Inter/Multimodal Approach.” He used data analysis to determine the feasibility and cost-effectiveness of establishing networks comprised of different transportation modes to alleviate airport congestion. Lee was a cowriter.

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