ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the level of service of major highway segments, railroad networks, and river routes, so that the critical links can be identified as the prime candidates for immediate improvement. It reveals the impacts of Mercosur on the current Brazilian transportation systems. The Brazilian transportation system reflects the historical absence of long-term-planning administrations. Since the colonization times, there has been a lack of rational and objective planning programs that could lead the country to more integrated and self-sustained transportation facilities. Focusing on Mercosur as one of the primary sources of traffic volume increases, together with population growth and eventually the growth in income, the expected impacts of its implementation are investigated through the impact of changes in macro economic variables and their effects upon the volume-to-capacity ratio. The increases in demand are calculated and translated into coefficients that directly impact the level of service of the most important highway segments of the Brazilian transportation network.
