The special issue focuses on how operational aspects of intermodal terminals and associated services constrain or enable the business models that then allow policy goals to be achieved. For example, government funders want to achieve modal shift by removing barriers such as upfront costs, sunk costs and availability of suitable terminal locations, transport authorities want to provide sufficient capacity and quality of infrastructure for freight operators, regulators want to ensure fair competition and open access to infrastructure and terminals. Questions to be considered relate to how the practical aspects of the intermodal transport sector constrain or enable these goals, and how public actors can incentivise private operators to work together through investment and planning to further support these goals.

Submitted paper topics and approaches are expected to be embedded in the existing literature, identifying suitable theoretical approaches or established frameworks, but the focus should very much be based on the practical side. Case studies based on access to industry actors or action research methodologies are particularly welcomed.

Interested authors are invited to submit full papers by the 31^st August 2014. Please follow the online submission process. RTBM is a double-blind review journal published by Elsevier. For more information on the journal: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/rtbm

Key dates

30 October 2014: Final manuscript due
15 March 2015: Publication of special issue

Please feel free to contact the editors directly to discuss your submission ideas and their suitability for the special issue. For more information and details on the call for papers see (but note that the submission deadline has been extended to 31^stAugust: