Critical analysis of the WORLDNET freight flow matrices

The growing trade between Europe and the rest of the world and the enlargement of the European Union has led the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy and Transport to fund Worldnet – Worldwide Cargo Flows – within the Framework 6 research project under the Scientific Support to Policies initiative. The main outputs have been an extended freight origin-destination database for the year 2005, extended road and rail networks, and new maritime and air-cargo networks. Moreover, these outputs were developed according to TRANSTOOLS (Tools for TRansport forecasting ANd Scenario testing) specifications. Due to the magnitude of the project and to the consequences that its results could generate in transportation planning at European level, this study assesses the validity of the freight origin-destination matrix. Our analysis indicates multiple problem cases, inconsistencies and aberrations.