Additionally, the nuclear energy content of U-235 has not to be put into the uranium. It sits there since the Uranium was created during that supernova, which created the space dust that formed our Solar system 4.6 billion years ago. For Antihydrogen, you have to actually provide any energy that is then confined in the antimatter. It is more or less an antimatter based battery which you have to charge first.
Just because something is impressive does not mean I want it around me. That we can build a nuclear fusion device is impressive. But I don't want a hydrogen bomb exploding in my backyard.
And that's plain wrong. Long distance trucking in Europe mainly means transporting goods from the large harbors in the Mediterranean (Genoa, Piraeus) and at the Northern Sea (Rotterdam, Hamburg) to the large industrial centers and back. Additionally, trucks are transporting raw materials, furniture and similar goods from Eastern Europe to the West and machines and machine parts to the East. This means crossing borders all the time.
They do have a massive canal network (portions of it dating back over 1000 years) [...]
Let's put it like this: The Han canal was completed in 489 BCE, more than 2500 years ago, and the complete Grand Canal of China, which extends the Han canal from Bejing to Hangzhou to over about 1100 miles, was completed 609 AD.
We can defeat gravity. The problem is the paperwork involved.