A Transportation Risk Analysis (TRA) tool has been used to accurately assess the risk associated to a variety of road and rail transportation cases representative of hazardous materials transport by land in Sicily. Due to the high risk level, some risk mitigation options have been investigated: the possibility of changing route and/or transport modalities have been examined for each transportation activity, all the combinations of road, rail and intermodal (road + rail) transport have been calculated and that minimising the risk has been identified with the aid of the TRA tool. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.