The global transportation network : the heart of in-transit visibility

Abstract

The Persian Gulf War highlighted problems concerning in-transit visibility (ITV). The lack of in-transit visibility resulted in over 20,000 of 40,000 containers entering the theater of operations being opened, inventoried, resealed, and shipped back into the transportation system because the troops did not know what the contents were. There was also a lack of ITV coverage over troop movements throughout area of operations. As a result of the Persian Gulf fiasco, the United States Transportation Command, was given the responsibility for designing and providing a DoD-wide ITV system using the Global Transportation Network (GTN). GTN is an integrated database system that provides users with real-time in-transit visibility information, and C2 capabilities to facilitate transportation planning and decision making. This thesis examines how well GTN is performing in the area of in-transit visibility since becoming operational in August of 1997, especially compared with commercial tracking systems. The results of this research will provide valuable insights into the actual in-transit visibility capabilities of the GTN system. It will also enable future and current transportation managers in DoD to become more aware of the ITV capabilities of GTN as well as commercial systems that can further improve the Global Transportation Network's capabilities.