The paper provides an overview of China’s relations with Poland in the context of the New Silk Road (NSR) as well as Łódź’s benefits form the One Belt One Road (OBOR). China has rapidly expanded the extent of its interactions with Poland since 2013 when it decided that the railway network should go through the shortest land connection of China to Western Europe. From the very beginning, Łódź was one of the most important points on the planned route. The article presents the key features of the city, while the case of the Łódź–Chengdu rail connection offers an insight into the region’s benefits from the NSR. The article concludes that although there have been positive changes in the economic situation of the Łódź region so far, there are still many areas of the Sino-Polish cooperation that seem crucial for the future of the OBOR.

This paper examines the possibility of locating electric vehicle charging stations using multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) and GIS. The study presents an integrated approach, which can be helpful in spatial planning. Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in using alternative power sources for motor vehicles. It is stimulated by top-down factors, such as regulations introduced by the European Commission or the introduction of the so-called “clean transport zones” by some local governments, as well as the bottom-up ones, including the increase in the cost of maintaining fossil fuel-powered cars. Local governments can employ the analysis presented in the paper to find a coherent development strategy for using electric vehicles (EVs) in cities. Based on the verified hypothesis, the Łódź city area has diverse suitability for EV charging stations, with predominant unfavourable regions for such investments. The research aims to find the methodology for performing the suitability analysis to locate new infrastructure elements in an urban space.

The article describes 30 small container terminals in the Baltic Sea Region and examines their competitive advantages. Terminals whose annual maximum throughput capacity does not exceed 150,000 TEU were specified to this end. Then, the PROMETHEE II ranking was performed using seven criteria: the length of the quay (C1), the number of RTG (C2) and STS (C3) cranes, the number of shortsea shipping connections (C4), the maximum depth at the quay (C5), the distance from motorways, expressways/national roads (C6) and from the national railway station (C7). Thus, container nodes with strategic advantages for the analyzed market sector were determined.

Poland’s convenient location on the border of the European Union (EU) and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) predisposes it to be a transhipment hub for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Yet, some research indicates that the BRI is not bringing the anticipated results. This, in turn, suggests that more analysis is needed to identify under what conditions countries benefit more and less. The article identifies those factors that may be considered driving forces that determine the future development of the BRI in Poland. First, we indicate forty-two STEEPVL (social, technological, economic, environmental, political, values, legal) factors that seem crucial for the further implementation of the BRI concept. Then we develop and analyse four scenarios for possible development paths of the BRI, as well as unprecedented events. The results of our study show that socioeconomic factors influence the further implementation of the BRI in Poland the most, while the least important are environmental issues. It is also most likely to be strongly influenced by long-term EU-China trade relations, long-term economic Sino-Polish relations, and the number of intermodal transport terminals and regional logistic centres in Poland.

New Silk Road – An Opportunity for the Development of Rail Container Transport in Poland?

Ekonomia XXI Wieku = Economics of the 21st Century, 2018, Nr 4 (20), s. 7-21