673 1 INTRODUCTION NAPA ports originated and developed primarily due to their favourable geographical position at the intersection of the traffic direction Adriatic‐Danube region. The main task of the Association ‐ comprising ports of Ravenna, Venice, Trieste, Koper, Rijeka, Monfalcone and Chioggia ‐ is to direct the ports to operate in the international market as a single multi‐ port system. Among other, harbour members agreed upon strengthening the links between transport infrastructure of the North Adriatic transport route and the Pan‐European transport corridors, supporting inclusion of the Central European Transport Corridor in the TEN ‐ T network (Perkovič et al. 2013, NAPA 2016). Considering their common hinterland area, NAPA ports act as mutually competitive port systems. On the other hand, they are representing common competitiveness toward other geo‐traffic flows where goods from countries of Middle Europe are transported. The aim of the proposed paper, representing the continuation of research (Kos et al. 2016) is to justify the redirection of the northern traffic flow by redirecting cargoes to the Adriatic Sea, i.e. through the ports of NAPA (the southern traffic flow). Structural analysis was conducted by exploring features of both traffic flows, by determining representative services for both directions: from the Northern and Southern European Traffic Flow Land Segment Analysis as Part of the Redirection Justification S. Vilke, D. Brčić & S. Kos University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia ABSTRACT: Natural geotraffic flows act as one of the most important factors directly affecting redirections of the world transportation routes. In terms of door‐to‐door multimodal transport chain, several routes from Far East toward European destinations exist, with Northern European route acting as prevailing one. The proposed paper elaborates possibilities of redirection of the traffic flow by directing cargoes to an alternative route through the Adriatic Sea. The aim is to justify realisation of mentioned possibility in terms of land transportation segment analysis, i.e. by analysing cargo transportation from ports to final destinations in Central Europe, placed in natural gravitational hinterland of ports of Northern Adriatic Port Association (NAPA). Geo‐traffic and logistics’ analyses of NAPA ports are presented in the paper. Container traffic and its trend as compared with Northern European ports are analysed. The development plans of inland connections are presented in function of justification of the traffic flow redirection. A model for the selection and evaluation of the optimal container transport route by using the multiple criteria analysis (MCA) has been introduced and developed. The model was applied for the selection of the representative service connecting Far East (origin) and the central Europe (destination) by detailed analysis of the land transportation segment. The PROMETHEE method was used for the model testing and evaluation. Summarised results are presented and discussed tending to confirmation of the traffic flow redirection justification. http://www.transnav.eu the International Journal on Marine Navigation and Safety of Sea Transportation Volume 11 Number 4 December 2017 DOI: 10.12716/1001.11.04.14