Australian interstate, intrastate and capital city road freight forecasts – 2022 update
In Australia, road transport is the predominant mode for moving freight between and within states. It is a vital link in various logistics chains, providing access for freight to ports and terminals and urban freight distribution between warehouses and retail outlets. It is also the dominant mode for moving freight over relatively short distances and where other alternatives are not readily available.
This report presents estimates and forecasts of interstate, intrastate and capital cities freight volumes for each state and territory in Australia. Estimates cover the period 1970 to 2020 and forecasts from 2020 to 2040. The forecasts are based on a combination of statistical models relating historical trends in road freight volumes and economic activity, informed by assumptions about likely future long-term economic and demographic trends.
Road Vehicles, Australia, January 2022 (re-issue)
This release provides statistics relating to the number of vehicles registered for road use in Australia on 31st January 2022. The statistics encompass all vehicles that were registered with an Australian state or territory motor vehicle registry for unrestricted use on public roads, and reported by jurisdictions to the National Exchange of Vehicle and Driver Information System (NEVDIS). This is the first annual release of Road Vehicles Australia, which replaces the ABS Motor Vehicle Census, discontinued in 2021. More statistics are available on the BITRE website and data.gov.au.
Waterline reports on trends in (a) throughput, (b) container handling productivity on the waterfront and the land side of ports in Australia, and (c) the cost of importing and exporting containers via five container ports. It covers both the loading and unloading of container ships and the transport of containers from container terminals.
This issue covers port terminal activity up to the June quarter 2021.
Freight vehicle congestion in Australia’s five major cities – 2021
This publication is the third in the series that uses vehicle telematics data to provide measures of traffic congestion for freight vehicles for selected routes across Australia’s five mainland state capital cities—Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. The selected routes comprise the major motorways, highways and arterial roads within each city that service both passenger and freight vehicles. This release includes measures for 71 routes. The estimates presented in this report cover calendar year 2021, and include comparisons with 2020 traffic congestion levels.
The results show that freight vehicle congestion returned to pre-pandemic levels across all five mainland Australian capital cities in 2021, largely due to the return of commuter traffic in our cities, particularly during peak periods, following the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020. In particular, freight vehicle traffic congestion increases in 2021 were larger in Melbourne, and to a lesser extent Sydney, where lockdown-related reductions in congestion observed in 2020 were most significant. Relative to pre-COVID-19 congestion levels in 2019, freight vehicle congestion increases have been most significant in proportionate terms across Brisbane routes, even higher than experienced across Sydney and Melbourne routes. Brisbane routes also experienced the largest increases in average excess travel time variability (uncertainty) since 2019, greater than in Sydney and Melbourne. Copies of the data displayed in the report are available here and on data.gov.au.
Trainline is a compendium of Australia's railways, providing insights, analysis and an understanding of the railway industry. Australia's railways are evolving, with changes within and outside the industry. These changes include logistics, commodity flows, technology, urban patronage and regional passenger services. The publication presents an overview and data on railway transport tasks performed; characteristics of the railways and train operators' rolling stock that runs; and aspects of railway performance including safety, environment and reliability.
Australian Infrastructure and Transport Statistics - Yearbook 2021
The aim of the Australian Infrastructure Statistics and Transport Yearbook is to provide a single, comprehensive annual source of infrastructure statistics for use by policymakers, industry leaders, transport analysts and the wider Australian community.
The publication is primarily a source of long-term, aggregate time series infrastructure statistics. Most statistics included in the publication are currently collected by BITRE or other Australian, state or territory government agencies.
The Yearbook has 11 chapters:
Waterline reports on trends in (a) throughput, (b) container handling productivity on the waterfront and the land side of ports in Australia, and (c) the cost of importing and exporting containers via five container ports. It covers both the loading and unloading of container ships and the transport of containers from container terminals.
This issue covers port terminal activity up to the December quarter 2020.
Freight vehicle congestion in Australia’s five major cities – 2020
This publication is the second in a planned regular series that uses vehicle telematics data to provide measures of traffic congestion for freight vehicles on 53 selected routes across Australia’s five mainland state capital cities—Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. The selected routes comprise the major motorways, highways and arterial roads within each city that service both passenger and freight vehicles. The estimates presented in this report cover calendar year 2020, and includes a comparison with 2019 traffic congestion measures.
The results show that freight vehicle congestion decreased across all five mainland Australian capital cities in 2020, largely due to lower commuter activity on roads, particularly in peak periods, as a result of COVID-19 lockdowns. Whilst peak period travel times were less pronounced in 2020 across all cities, this effect was more significant in Sydney and Melbourne, because those cities had larger pre-COVID-19 traffic peaks and experienced longer lockdowns (particularly Melbourne), and less significant in other state capital cities. Copies of the data displayed in the report are available here and on data.gov.au.
Freight vehicle congestion in Australia’s five major cities - 2019
This publication is the first of a planned annual series that uses vehicle telematics data to provide measures of traffic congestion for freight vehicles on 53 selected routes across Australia’s five mainland state capital cities—Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. The selected routes comprise the major motorways, highways and arterial roads within each city that service both passenger and freight vehicles. The estimates presented in this report cover calendar year 2019.
The results show peaks in freight vehicle average travel times coincide with morning and evening peak commuter flows—for instance motorways tend to show morning peaks moving towards city CBDs and afternoon peaks moving away from it. Urban motorways exhibit more distinct travel time peak periods than non-motorway routes.
Australian Sea Freight 2018-19
This is the latest in a series of Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics (BITRE) reports that provide information on Australian sea freight movements, vessel activity, the use of coastal trading licences, and the size and composition of the Australian trading fleet. This report contains statistics on maritime freight and shipping activities in Australia from 2009–10 to 2018–19.
Import and export data up to 2020 has been made available through a visualisation on the National Freight Data Hub prototype website.