Strategic Planning For Multimodal Transportation Hub: A Case Study Of Chiang Sean Port 2 And Pakbara Deep Seaport Project

Nowadays, Thailand logistics development is in the level of Physical Distribution which supports only delivery of the goods to the consumers. This level also covers the activities of the transportation, the stock of goods, material management, and packaging of the products. Thailand logistics transport modes, however, are not integrated. The lack of efficient logistics in multimodal transportation logistics obstructs Thailand to be the good logistic hub. So the Government of Thailand needs to focus in transport infrastructure to link all modes to be multimodal transportation.

Since Thailand developed the strategic planning, the success appropriate level has not reached. One of main reasons is lack of continuity in implementation of plans, each implementation of plan is not developed in the same direction and all plans are not integrated together. In addition, due to limitated budget and resources. In order to optimize resources in the right direction and achieve highest efficiency, Thailand needs the strategic planning which be created by basing on the multimodal transportation to be the guideline and to be indicator to meet the goal. It is obvious that GOT needs to improve implementation plan of strategic planning because of the strategic planning is a vital part in budget allocation process.

Ms. Suphitcha Phoemphoonthanyakit made a research which aimed to improve the strategic planning for multimodal transportation hub development in Thailand. Her 3 specific objectives are to (1) investigate the existing strategic planning of multimodal transport logistics and to get the key multimodal transportation parameters so that the strengths and weaknesses can be identified, (2) find out the appropriate strategic planning for multimodal transportation hub development project; and (3) propose the recommendations for improving strategic planning which appropriates for multimodal transportation hub development project.

Her result showed that in order to develop multimodal transport projects, the key parameters which should be considered are technical development, project demand, project return, laws and regulations, environmental concern, resources availability, and political concern.

From the expert interview, the researcher found out that the root causes of problem come from:
a. The department does not have the same direction to develop their projects.
b. The department proposes the projects by lacking of consider the strategic plan under the ministry.
c. The department proposes the projects by aiming target that they have to get the budget of their project at least same amount of previous year or otherwise more then previous year.
d. The department proposes the projects by sticking on their function of work.
e. The department proposes the projects and conducts the feasibility study by themselves so the bias may occur in order to make the project feasible.

She also found out that the projects which each department propose could not meet the key parameters of multimodal transportation hub. The main factors that causes the case studies could not be the multimodal transportation hub are:

a. The case studies lack of railroad transportation infrastructure development project and have low the opportunities to be the hub due to the demand are not high.
b. The demand forecast of case studies are significant different from the actual demand from interview and site observation.

For budget allocation for multimodal transportation, researcher uses budget allocation process toward the case studies in order to find out the characteristic of budget allocation of case studies. After researcher towards the budget allocation process to the case studies completely, the researcher found that three main problems occurred.

The first problem is the budget allocation for four year implementation plan is not optimization. On the right way, the budget should be allocated to projects that are multimodal transportation instead because they can give more advantages to logistics transportation system. The root cause of this problem comes from, OTP could not develop the case studies by integrating with other projects in order to be multimodal transportation.

The second problem is the budget allocation for yearly implementation plan is not optimization. This problem is similar with the first problem. The difference is the excursion area, the first problem occurred at four year implementation plan but the second problem occurred at yearly implementation plan. The OTP could not develop the case studies by integrating with other projects in order to be multimodal transportation.

The third problem is no budget allocation to case studies. The root cause of this problem comes from:
a. Lack of continuousness in project development due to the political problem.
b. Lack of budget expenditure data of previous yearly during budget requisition forming.

Her thesis abstract is copied and posted.

ABSTRACT

Due to the main national policy of the government to strengthen the position of Thailand as the economic and transport hub of the region, it is necessary to develop the multimodal transportation which can efficiently link all modes of transport, i.e., land transport (highway and railway), waterway transport, and air transport so that it can reduce the national logistics costs and lessen the energy consumption of transport sector. Although Thailand has developed the strategic planning but still it has not reached the success up to the appropriate level as targeted. Moreover, Thailand has limitations in budget and resources. In order to optimize resources in the right direction and achieve highest efficiency, Thailand needs the effective budget allocation system to comply with multimodal transportation logistics plan.

A research has been done based on the two case studies which were conducted on the river port in the north part and deep seaport in the south part of Thailand. A qualitative research technique has been used by taking into account expert’s interviews, site observation, and main data source.

The finding of this study has shown that the strategic multimodal transportation planning of Thailand has some deficiencies and obstacles in project integration. Therefore, the recommendation of strategic multimodal transportation planning which is developed in the study will help the Government of Thailand, the Bureau of the Budget, Ministry of Transportation, and The departments under the Ministry of transportation, and other participants in project integration to follow the same direction and properly allocate the budget for the projects to achieve the multimodal transportation goal.