How will China-Singapore International Land-Sea Trade Corridor affect route choice behaviour? A discrete choice model

ABS T R A C T Under the government-to-government cooperation framework, the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on China-Singapore International Land-Sea Trade Corridor (C-S-ILSTC) between Singapore and Chongqing has been signed in 2018, with the objective to improve the connectivity between Southeast Asia and Western China region via the Beibu Gulf port. C-S-ILSTC provides a new and efficient intermodal freight transportation route choice, which is expected to reconstruct the regional intermodal container transportation network. In this study, we formulate a discrete route choice model based on stated preference survey to analyse the route choice behaviour between Southeast Asia and western China region under the intermodal container transport network with C-S-ILSTC. Based on the modelling results, we further discuss the impact of significant route choice influential factors, such as transit time, shipping fee, cargo type, historical experience of using the route, company size, annual throughput, and business area. In addition, descriptive statistics and word cloud analysis are provided to investigate respondents' underlying attitudes on the most important route choice influential factors. Scenario analysis is further conducted to demonstrate the impact of subsidy on respondents' willingness to switch to the newly introduced C-S-ILSTC for freight transportation. The results provide policy implications on improving the utilisation rate of C-S-ILSTC.