The willingness to pay for a certain attribute (time, reliability, comfort, security) is defined as the marginal rate of substitution between this attribute and the money. This willingness to pay is used to monetize benefits in project evaluation and to forecast demand for new projects. In freight transport, in particular in rail freight transport, the reliability and the potential improvement of this variable are often even more importantthan time savings. Despite the importance of such variables, a relativelysmall number of studies (using both stated and revealed preference) are dedicated to the valuation of the value of time and the value of reliability in freight transport. These two main issues in the cross-Alpine and Cross-Pyrennean choice between rail and road freight transport are reviewed. On the base of the last revealed preference studies on cross Alpine and cross Pyrennean transport, it discusses the value and the importance of thesevariables. Moreover, on the basis of the Cross Alpine Freight Transport survey of 2004, it provides an original estimation of the value of time in this context, using the classic logit model and the mixed logit model. Theanalysis shows a very high variability of results and questions their impact in terms of socio-economic evaluation. The effect of distributed values in the context of new operators and the potential for revenue maximization for rail infrastructure managers, in the context of market liberalization, are discussed. For the covering abstract see ITRD E145999
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