Transportation is made up of events in which one or more objects transport one or more other objects. Each transportation event is an event in which an object (in the role of transporter) aids in the translational movement of another object (having the role of transportees), so that both objects move together along the same complete pathway. Optionally, one of these objects, or some third object moving along with them, provides the force to make the movement happen. Examples of transportation events include automobile transportation, riding a bicycle, dogs pulling goods on a sled, a wagon with groceries rolling down a hill, a person carrying clothes in a suitcase, etc. In that last case, note that the transporter is the suitcase, not the person. Note that the transporter in a transportation event need not be in motion relative to its destination throughout the transportation event; an automobile transportation is a single transportation event even if it has sub-events in which the driver and all of the passengers disembark while the car is parked and refueled. A single transportation event may also have more than one transporter. For example, a sofa may be transported accross a living room floor by two people working together. Events which are not transportation events include a river conveying some flotsam, the wind blowing a leaf, a conveyor belt moving a widget to the next person on an assembly line, or a walking beast of burden that is carrying nothing. The first three of these negative examples are stationary conveying events, since the would-be transporter doesn't actually change its overall location; in the fourth case the unburdened beast has no transportees and the event is simply the process of an animal walking.

Logistics is a field of study concerned with the flow of material and information between suppliers and consumers, usually for the purpose of creating some product or carrying out some task. Important applications include military logistics and transportation logistics.