The line graph illustrates the amount of items transferred in the UK from 1980 to 2008 using 4 types of transport.
Overall, all four methods of transportation demonstrated an increasing number of transfers throughout a period. Road was the most popular way of transferring goods, while pipeline stood at the end of the ranking.
The leader of goods transportation was the road, starting with approximately 70 million tonnes in 1980 and peaking in 2004 with 90 million tonnes, standing at this point until 2008. On the contrary, the pipeline illustrated the lowest results, with about 5 million tonnes in 1980, experiencing a sharp increase from 1984 to 1988 (from 6 to 18 million tonnes, respectively). After 1988 the tonnage of transferred stayed almost still, slightly growing to nearly 22 million tonnes in 2004, which remained stable until 2008.
Regarding water and rail types of transport, they started from almost equal amount of transferred items – around 40 million tonnes. Later, water rank increased to 55, stagnating to 2004, when the amount fell to about 50, growing again to approximately 65 in 2008. Finally, rail transportation demonstrated a rapid decrease to 30 million tonnes in 1992, then it increased to almost 40 and remained stable until 2000, falling dramatically to 30 in 2004. Finally, rail transport showed its stable growth to around 42 million tonnes at the end of the period.