Barge transportation benefits heavy manufacturing and other capital-intensive industries by lowering delivery expenses for raw materials and reducing costs for shipping its goods and products. These savings by reducing production costs help increase productivity, making these plants more competitive in global markets.

Water transportation can also greatly expand the markets for a region’s natural resources, such as coal, or for other low valued commodities, like forestry products. In many cases, shipping costs dictate market competitiveness for these kinds of commodities and products.

The Tennessee-Tombigbee has become the preferred route to transport heavy machinery, equipment, and other kinds of oversized, finished products. A shipper that takes advantage of the slack water conditions of the Tenn-Tom and avoids the swift currents of the Mississippi River can use a smaller horsepower towboat to reduce fuel consumption and lower shipping costs.
As fuel costs rise and highways become more congested, waterways will become even more important for future commerce and trade. Unlike highways and railroads, waterways have untapped transport capacity and can sustain increased shipments with less marginal costs.
Waterborne commerce also has much less adverse impacts on air pollution and the environment than shipments by truck or rail. For examples, trucks release 19 times more nitrogen oxide to the environment and 9 more times of carbon monoxide than that released by towboats. Deaths and injuries are 10 times more probable for land modes than for water transportation.