Improving Transnational Transport Corridors
In the OIC Member Countries: Concepts and Cases
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The scientific and grey literature shows transport corridors to be politically, economically,
socially and technically driven, providing the most reliable and cost effective trade routes for
land locked countries, whilst being important drivers of regionalization and integration. In
terms of format, corridors should be considered as multidimensional, both in the physical and
metaphysical sense, for they are multimodal and multi-route, stimulating choice and
competition, benefiting traders and travelers and by doing so, maximizing economic and social
opportunities Srivastava (2011). Hope and Cox (2015) further discern that the development of
a corridor evolves from a basis transport route through to an economic corridor. The
subsequent stages are (1) Transport Corridor, (2) Transport and Trade Facilitation Corridor,
(3) Logistics Corridor, (4) Urban Development Corridor and finally (5) Economic Corridor.
Srivastava (2011) identifies a linear process with corridors starting as natural transport routes
and investments in hard infrastructure for one or more modes of transport to become a
transport corridor. The next evolution step requires development of the “soft infrastructure” of
transport services and transport logistics. Evolution into a fully-fledged economic corridor
requires a broader approach and investments in the regions served by the corridor. Srivastava
(2011) further finds that corridors must stimulate economic growth to be viable but corridors
do not create economic strength in itself, but they channel, focus, and amplify the potential for
economic growth. Thus, a corridor “from nowhere to nowhere through nowhere“ would not be
so meaningful. On the other hand, early developments of rail corridors in the USA did connect
something with nowhere with an aim of developing the economy in the “Wild West”. Similarly,
a corridor linking two nodes but with no potential for growth in between is also of limited
interest. As mentioned, the stops along a corridor are more interesting than connecting the end
points.
The area of influence of the corridor (narrow or broad) in combination with national
demarcation results in a four zone scheme (See , where the development of a
national corridor to a regional one, is the movement from Zone 2 to 3, and may involve the
linking of national corridors.