The proposed study evaluates potential locations of inland ports that might serve a market through different alternatives, in terms of transport modes, costs and distances. The present study has the additional goal of including the external costs in the decision process. For this scope, a linear programming model with both continuous and binary decision variables is given. The required parameters and the constraints of the problem are shown, together with real data concerning the Italian north-western regions and the related infrastructures. Thanks to the proposed model, different intermodal freight logistic networks are compared; in particular, a sensitivity analysis on both the rail capacity and external costs is performed. Note that the outcomes can be used for improving current transport policies that might foster a more efficient and less impacting hinterland transport solution.