Chapter 8 Transport And Communication

The locations of natural resources, economic activities (production centres), and markets (consuming centres) are rarely in the same place.

Transport, Communication, and Trade are essential services that create the links necessary to connect these spatially separated elements.

In a system of mass production and exchange, where different regions specialize in producing goods for which they are best suited, trade relies heavily on efficient transportation and communication networks.

Furthermore, a high standard of living and quality of life in modern society are closely linked to the effectiveness of these systems.

Historically, the means of transport and communication were often intertwined (e.g., messages carried by transport). Today, they have developed into distinct and specialized sectors.

Transport provides the physical infrastructure (network of links and carriers) through which trade and the movement of people and goods occur.

Land Transport

Transport is a service or facility that moves people and goods using various carriers (humans, animals, vehicles) across land, water, and air.

Land transport primarily involves movement over the ground, using roads and railways. Other modes include pipelines (for liquids/gases), ropeways, and cableways.

Transportation is a highly organized service industry designed to meet society's fundamental need for mobility. It comprises the physical routes (arteries), the vehicles, and the management systems for maintenance, loading, unloading, and delivery.

Nations also develop extensive transport systems for defense purposes.

Reliable and fast transportation, coupled with efficient communication, plays a vital role in fostering cooperation and unity among geographically dispersed populations.

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A Transport Network is formed by linking multiple places (called nodes) together using a series of routes (called links), creating a distinct pattern of connectivity.

Pack Animals

In earlier times, before mechanized transport became widespread, humans served as carriers, and later, animals were widely used as beasts of burden.

Different animals are utilized depending on the terrain and climate:

• Horses are still used as draught animals (for pulling loads).
• Dogs and reindeer are used to pull sledges in snowy regions of North America, Northern Europe, and Siberia.
• Mules are commonly preferred in mountainous areas due to their agility.
• Camels are used for caravan transport in deserts.
• In India, bullocks are traditionally used for pulling carts in rural areas.

The invention of the wheel was a significant step, leading to the use of carts and wagons.

The invention of the steam engine in the 18th century brought about a revolution in transport, notably with the development of railways. The first public railway opened in 1825 between Stockton and Darlington, England.

Railways became the dominant and fastest mode of transport in the 19th century, facilitating access to and development of continental interiors for agriculture, mining, and manufacturing (especially in the U.S.A.).

The internal combustion engine further revolutionized land transport, improving road quality and leading to the widespread use of motor cars and trucks.

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Generally, older, more basic forms of transport like human porters or pack animals are the most expensive per unit of cargo, while large freighters are the cheapest.

However, these traditional methods remain important for accessing remote interior areas in large countries and are still used in densely populated regions like parts of India and China where people transport goods by carrying them or using human-powered carts.

Roads

Road transport is considered the most economical mode for carrying goods over short distances compared to railways.

A key advantage of road transport is its ability to provide convenient door-to-door service.

However, roads have limitations depending on their type and environmental conditions:

• Unmetalled roads: Simple to build but ineffective in all seasons, becoming unusable or difficult during heavy rains.
• Metalled roads: More durable but can still be severely impacted by heavy rains and floods.

In areas prone to heavy rain or floods, the elevated rail-tracks and consistent maintenance of railway services offer a more reliable alternative.

Despite limitations, roads are crucial for trade, commerce, and tourism, especially in vast and developing countries where the railway network may not be extensive enough or cost-effective for widespread local connectivity.

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The quality of road networks varies significantly between developed and developing nations due to the high costs associated with construction and maintenance.

• Developed countries: Feature extensive networks of high-quality roads, including motorways, autobahns (Germany), and inter-state highways designed for high-speed, uninterrupted travel. Large, powerful lorries are common for transporting heavy loads.
• Developing countries: Often face challenges with road quality and density due to funding constraints.

Globally, the total length of motorable roads is limited (around 15 million km). North America possesses about 33% of this, having the highest road density and number of vehicles.

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Traffic Flows: Road traffic has increased dramatically, leading to congestion, particularly in cities, when road networks cannot handle the volume.

Traffic flow typically shows daily peaks during morning and evening rush hours.

Urban congestion is a widespread problem globally, necessitating urban transport solutions such as higher parking fees, mass rapid transit systems, improved public transport, and expressways.

Railways

Railways are an efficient mode of land transport for moving bulky goods and large numbers of passengers over long distances.

The width between the rails, known as the gauge, varies internationally. Common gauges include broad gauge (over 1.5m), standard gauge (1.44m, used in the U.K.), metre gauge (1m), and smaller gauges.

Commuter trains are widely used in countries like the U.K., U.S.A., Japan, and India, transporting millions of people daily within and around cities.

Worldwide, there are approximately 1.3 million km of railway lines open for traffic.

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Distribution and characteristics of railway networks in major regions:

• Europe: Has one of the densest rail networks globally (around 440,000 km), largely double or multiple-tracked. Belgium has the highest density (1 km of railway per 6.5 sq km). Industrial regions have the highest densities. Passenger transport is often more significant than freight. Important hubs include London, Paris, Brussels, Milan, Berlin, and Warsaw. Underground railways are crucial in cities like London and Paris. The Channel Tunnel connects London and Paris.
• Russia: Railways handle about 90% of the country's transport. The network is densest west of the Ural Mountains, centered around Moscow, which serves as a major hub with lines radiating across the vast territory. Underground and commuter trains are also important in Moscow. Despite the network size, the vast distances mean highways are less dominant than railways.
• North America: Possesses one of the most extensive rail networks globally (nearly 40% of the world's total). Unlike Europe, railways are primarily used for transporting large volumes of bulky freight over long distances (ores, grains, timber, machinery) rather than passengers. The densest network is in the highly industrialized and urbanized East Central U.S.A. and adjacent Canada.
• Canada: Railways are mainly in the public sector and cover sparsely populated areas. Transcontinental railways are key for transporting wheat and coal.
• Australia: Has about 40,000 km of railways, with a significant portion (25%) in New South Wales. The main line runs coast-to-coast from Perth to Sydney. New Zealand's railways primarily serve farming areas on the North Island.
• South America: The densest networks are concentrated in the Pampas region of Argentina and the coffee-growing region of Brazil, collectively accounting for 40% of the continent's total route length. Chile has coastal lines linked to inland mining sites. Other countries generally have short lines connecting ports to the interior without extensive interconnections. A single transcontinental line connects Buenos Aires (Argentina) with Valparaiso (Chile) across the Andes.
• Asia: The densest networks are in highly populated countries like Japan, China, and India. Other countries have fewer routes. West Asia has the least developed rail infrastructure due to vast deserts and low population density.
• Africa: Despite being the second-largest continent, Africa has a limited rail network (around 40,000 km), with South Africa having a large share (18,000 km) driven by mining activities (gold, diamond, copper). Important routes connect mining areas to ports, but inter-country networks are not well-developed outside of Southern Africa.

Trans-Continental Railways: These lines span across entire continents, linking two distant ends. They were built for both economic (facilitating trade over long distances) and political reasons.

Examples of important trans-continental railways:

• Trans-Siberian Railway (Russia): The longest (9,332 km), double-tracked, and electrified transcontinental railway in the world. Runs from St. Petersburg in the west to Vladivostok on the Pacific coast. It has been crucial for opening up Russia's Asian territories to European markets and connects several important regional centres. It also has links to other parts of Asia.
• Trans-Canadian Railway (Canada): This 7,050 km line runs from Halifax in the east to Vancouver in the west. Initially built for political unity, it gained significant economic importance by connecting industrial regions with agricultural and forest areas, enabling complementary trade. It also links to the Great Lakes waterway system.
• The Union and Pacific Railway (U.S.A.): Links New York on the Atlantic coast to San Francisco on the Pacific coast, passing through major cities. Key goods transported include ores, grain, paper, chemicals, and machinery.
• The Australian Trans-Continental Railway: Runs west-east across southern Australia, connecting Perth to Sydney. Another significant line runs north-south from Adelaide.
• The Orient Express: Historically significant line running from Paris to Istanbul, connecting major European cities. It drastically reduced travel time compared to the sea route.

There are proposals for new trans-continental lines, such as a Trans-Asiatic Railway connecting Istanbul to Bangkok.

Water Transport

One of the major advantages of water transport is that it generally does not require building infrastructure for the route itself (like roads or rail tracks), as oceans and many rivers/lakes naturally provide the path.

Oceans are interconnected and navigable by ships of various sizes, requiring only port facilities at points of origin and destination.

Water transport is significantly cheaper than land transport because the friction of water is much less than that of land, resulting in lower energy costs for moving cargo.

Water transport is categorized into sea routes (navigating oceans and seas) and inland waterways (using rivers, canals, and lakes).

Sea Routes

Oceans function as natural highways, offering smooth paths traversable in various directions without the need for costly maintenance of the route itself.

Adapting vessels to navigate the seas has been a critical human achievement.

Compared to land and air transport, ocean transport is the most economical method for carrying large volumes of bulky cargo over long distances, especially between continents.

Modern ships are equipped with advanced navigation technology (radar, wireless) and specialized features like refrigerated chambers for perishable goods, tankers for liquids, and containerisation systems, which have greatly improved cargo handling efficiency at major ports worldwide.

Shipping Canals

Artificial waterways, or shipping canals, are constructed to shorten distances and facilitate trade by linking bodies of water or bypassing difficult routes. The Suez Canal and the Panama Canal are two globally vital examples.

The Suez Canal:

• Built in Egypt, completed in 1869, it connects the Mediterranean Sea (at Port Said in the north) with the Red Sea (at Port Suez in the south).
• It provides a direct sea link between Europe and the Indian Ocean, drastically reducing the distance between ports like Liverpool (Europe) and Colombo (Asia) compared to the much longer route around the Cape of Good Hope.
• It is a sea-level canal, meaning it does not have locks like the Panama Canal.
• It is approximately 160 km long and 11-15 meters deep.
• Around 100 ships pass through daily, taking 10-12 hours to transit.
• While convenient, the tolls for using the canal are high, sometimes making the longer Cape Route cheaper for voyages where speed is not critical.
• A railway runs alongside the canal, and a freshwater canal from the Nile connects to Ismailia to supply freshwater to the canal's ports.

The Panama Canal:

• Located across the Isthmus of Panama, it connects the Atlantic Ocean (east) with the Pacific Ocean (west). It was constructed by the U.S. government.
• It is about 72 km long and includes a deep cut through the land.
• Unlike the Suez, it uses a system of six locks to raise and lower ships across different elevations (a total rise and fall of 26 meters) before they enter the Gulf of Panama.
• It significantly shortens sea distances, for example, between New York and San Francisco (by 13,000 km), and between Western Europe and the U.S. West Coast, or North-eastern/Central U.S.A. and East/Southeast Asia.
• Its overall economic significance is considered slightly less than the Suez Canal, but it is vital for the economies of Latin American countries.

Inland Waterways

Inland waterways utilise navigable rivers, canals, lakes, and coastal areas for transporting cargo and passengers using boats and steamers.

The feasibility of inland waterways depends on factors such as the width and depth of the water channel, the consistency of water flow, and the available transport technology.

In dense forests, rivers often serve as the only means of transport.

Inland waterways are well-suited for transporting heavy and bulky cargo like coal, cement, timber, and metallic ores.

Historically, riverways were the primary transport routes (e.g., in ancient India) but their importance sometimes declined due to competition from railways, water diversion for irrigation, and inadequate maintenance.

Developed countries have recognized the importance of inland waterways for domestic and international trade. Many rivers have been improved for navigation through dredging, stabilizing banks, and building dams/barrages to manage water flow.

Important Inland Waterways of the World:

• The Rhine Waterway: Flows through Germany and the Netherlands, navigable for 700 km from Rotterdam to Basel (Switzerland). Ocean vessels can reach Cologne. It connects the industrial Ruhr region (Germany) to the North Atlantic Sea Route, making it one of the world's busiest waterways, handling huge cargo volumes annually.
• The Danube Waterway: Serves Eastern Europe, rising in the Black Forest and flowing eastward through many countries. It is navigable for a significant distance, primarily transporting goods like wheat, maize, timber, and machinery.
• The Volga Waterway: The most important navigable river system in Russia, providing over 11,000 km of waterways draining into the Caspian Sea. Canals connect it to the Moscow region and the Black Sea.
• The Great Lakes – St. Lawrence Seaway (North America): A unique commercial waterway formed by the Great Lakes (Superior, Huron, Erie, Ontario) linked by canals (Soo Canal, Welland Canal) and the St. Lawrence River estuary. Ocean-going vessels can navigate deep into the continent to Montreal. Goods are often trans-shipped to smaller vessels beyond Montreal due to rapids, requiring canals to bypass them.
• The Mississippi Waterways (U.S.A.): The Mississippi-Ohio system connects the interior U.S. to the Gulf of Mexico, allowing large steamers to travel far inland.

Air Transport

Air transport is the fastest mode of transportation, particularly for long distances, but it is also generally the most costly.

It is preferred for transporting passengers over long distances and for rapid movement of valuable cargo worldwide.

Air transport is often the only viable way to access remote or difficult-to-reach areas that are inaccessible by other means.

It has significantly improved connectivity globally, overcoming geographical barriers like mountains, snow fields, and deserts. For example, it allows supplying remote communities like the Eskimos in Northern Canada despite frozen ground or reaching areas in the Himalayas blocked by landslides or snow.

Airways also possess considerable strategic importance, demonstrated in military operations.

The air transport network is undergoing rapid expansion.

Developing and operating air transport requires extensive infrastructure, including hangars, landing facilities, fuelling points, and maintenance services for aircraft. Constructing airports is expensive, leading to more extensive development in highly industrialized countries with high traffic volumes.

Thanks to air travel, virtually no place in the world is more than about 35 hours away today.

Commercial air transport developed significantly after World War II, led by the U.S.A. Hundreds of commercial airlines now provide regular services globally.

Advanced aircraft, such as supersonic jets, have further reduced travel times between continents.

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Inter-Continental Air Routes:

• In the Northern Hemisphere, there is a prominent east-west band of inter-continental air routes, especially dense over Eastern U.S.A., Western Europe, and Southeast Asia.
• The U.S.A. alone accounts for a significant portion (60%) of the world's airways.
• Major cities like New York, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Rome, Moscow, Karachi, New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangkok, Singapore, Tokyo, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago function as crucial nodal points where routes converge and radiate to various continents.

Regions like Africa, the Asian part of Russia, and South America have fewer air services.

In the Southern Hemisphere, air services are limited between 10° and 35° latitudes due to lower population density, less landmass, and varying levels of economic development.

Pipelines

Pipelines are a specialized mode of transport primarily used for moving liquids and gases, ensuring a continuous, uninterrupted flow.

Common materials transported by pipelines include water, petroleum, and natural gas.

Water supply to homes via pipelines is a familiar example globally. Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) is also supplied through pipelines in many areas.

Pipeline technology can potentially transport liquefied coal as well.

In some places, like New Zealand, even milk is transported from farms to factories via pipelines.

In the U.S.A., there is an extensive network of oil pipelines connecting oil-producing regions to consumer markets. The 'Big Inch' is a well-known example, transporting petroleum from the Gulf of Mexico to the Northeastern states. Pipelines carry a substantial portion (around 17%) of all freight in the U.S. in terms of tonne-kilometres.

In Europe, Russia, West Asia, and India, pipelines link oil wells to refineries, ports, or domestic markets.

Turkmenistan in Central Asia has built pipelines to Iran and China.

Proposed projects, like the Iran-India pipeline via Pakistan, could become some of the world's longest oil and natural gas pipelines.

Communications

Communications involve the methods and technologies used to transmit information over distances.

Historically, methods for long-distance communication were limited, with the telegraph and telephone being significant early inventions.

The telegraph played a role in expansion, such as the colonisation of the American West.

The telephone became crucial for urban development in the U.S. in the 20th century, enabling businesses to centralize management while having branch offices in smaller towns.

Even today, the telephone remains a widely used communication tool.

In developing countries, the widespread adoption of cell phones, facilitated by satellite technology, is particularly important for connecting rural areas.

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Recent decades have seen unprecedented developments in communication technology.

A major breakthrough was the introduction of optic fiber cables (OFC). Due to competition, telecommunication companies upgraded their copper cable networks to OFC, which allows for rapid, secure, and virtually error-free transmission of vast amounts of data.

Since the 1990s, the digitization of information led to the convergence of telecommunications and computers, forming integrated networks, most notably the Internet.

Satellite Communication

Satellite technology revolutionized communication starting in the 1970s following pioneering space research by the U.S.A. and the former U.S.S.R.

Artificial satellites orbiting the Earth can connect even the most remote locations globally.

A key impact of satellite communication is that the cost and time of communication become largely independent of distance. It costs roughly the same to communicate across a continent as it does across town via satellite link.

India has made significant progress in satellite technology, launching satellites like Aryabhatt (1979), Bhaskar-I (1979), Rohini (1980), and APPLE (1981), which have enhanced long-distance communication, television, and radio broadcasting, and improved services like weather forecasting.

Cyber Space – Internet

Cyberspace refers to the electronic, computerised realm where communication and information access occur over computer networks, without the need for physical movement of the sender or receiver.

The Internet, including the World Wide Web (www), is the primary component of cyberspace.

Cyberspace is ubiquitous, accessible from virtually anywhere with connectivity (office, home, moving vehicles).

The growth of the Internet has been exceptionally rapid; the number of users increased from under 50 million in 1995 to over 2 billion by 2010.

Initially dominated by users in the U.S.A., the majority of Internet users are now located in developing countries (e.g., China, India), though developed countries like the U.S.A., U.K., Germany, and Japan still have significant user bases.

Cyberspace is expanding human economic and social interactions through various digital activities:

• E-mail: Electronic message exchange.
• E-commerce: Conducting business and trade online.
• E-learning: Education delivered electronically.
• E-governance: Government services provided through digital platforms.

The Internet, combined with other modern communication systems like fax, television, and radio, is increasingly accessible globally, transcending geographical distance and time barriers.

These advancements in communication, arguably more than transportation alone, have significantly contributed to the reality of the 'global village', where the world feels interconnected and distances seem much smaller.

Exercises

This section provides exercises to evaluate understanding of the chapter, including multiple-choice questions, short answer questions, and more detailed response questions, along with suggested projects or activities for further exploration.

Choose The Right Answer From The Four Alternatives Given Below

Multiple-choice questions testing recall of facts and specific examples from the chapter.

Answer The Following Questions In About 30 Words

Short answer questions requiring concise definitions or explanations of terms and concepts like problems with road transport in specific terrains, trans-continental railways, advantages of water transport, and the digital divide.

Answer The Following Questions In Not More Than 150 Words

More detailed questions requiring elaboration and discussion on topics such as the complementary nature of different transport modes, major regions with dense airway networks, and how cyberspace impacts economic and social life.

Project/Activity

Suggestions for practical tasks like investigating BPO activities or researching international travel documents to connect chapter concepts to real-world applications.