Brexit and railfreight

[Sad Sprinter]

Let's PLEASE avoid a Brexit argument.

My question is simple and non-political; looks like we are heading for a hard-Brexit which will cause long lorry qeues. Is this not a perfect oppertunity to shift freight traffic onto trains through the Channel Tunnel? Surely a long freight train would be more efficient than long lorry lines? I suspect this is not possible however, what would be the obstacles to this?

 

[furnessvale]

Except that whatever forces drive the long lorry lines would presumably also drive delays to trains. One possible advantage for trains, provided safe storage could be provided, there would not be a driver sitting with each load.

Delays could promote the use of unaccompanied loads, both trailers and containers/swap bodies.

Delays to short sea traffic could also assist deep sea traffic from non EU countries, an area where rail freight is stronger.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Although it isn't particularly obvious when thousands of lorries are stuck in parallel lines, each vehicle is inherently 'autonomous' so if there is a problem with documentation, veterinary standards or whatever it can be conceptually be taken to one side whilst other 'problem free' vehicles pass.

Whereas a train with (say) 39 containers of urgent food and medical supplies and one 'dodgy' box full of incorrectly cooked sausages gets held up complete at Dollands Moor or Frethun with no quick resolution.

 

[furnessvale]

Although it isn't particularly obvious when thousands of lorries are stuck in parallel lines, each vehicle is inherently 'autonomous' so if there is a problem with documentation, veterinary standards or whatever it can be conceptually be taken to one side whilst other 'problem free' vehicles pass.

Whereas a train with (say) 39 containers of urgent food and medical supplies and one 'dodgy' box full of incorrectly cooked sausages gets held up complete at Dollands Moor or Frethun with no quick resolution.

Agreed. If the latter became a problem I can see a reachstacker being deployed at each end to remove offending boxes.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

Although it isn't particularly obvious when thousands of lorries are stuck in parallel lines, each vehicle is inherently 'autonomous' so if there is a problem with documentation, veterinary standards or whatever it can be conceptually be taken to one side whilst other 'problem free' vehicles pass.

Whereas a train with (say) 39 containers of urgent food and medical supplies and one 'dodgy' box full of incorrectly cooked sausages gets held up complete at Dollands Moor or Frethun with no quick resolution.

Customs clearance for freight trains is always carried out at the inland terminal that the train is heading to, never at Dollands Moor. So rail would have an advantage over road in that respect.
However, I suspect that the main beneficiaries of any problems on the Calais-Dover route would be the frequent trains to Zeebrugge and Rotterdam, feeding into short-sea shipping or ro ro freight to East Coast ports like Tilbury, Immingham or Teesport. These have done much better than freight through the Channel Tunnel in recent years.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Noting that much of the surviving rail freight traffic via the tunnel is quasi-bulk, such as china clay for paper making, bottled water in cargowaggons, aluminium ingots or steel rails, how many inland terminals (apart from Ripple Lane) are currently set up to deal with regular trainloads of 'mixed' European containers and swap-bodies?

 

[squizzler]

I thought there was plan set in motion before uk was kicked out the EU (Originally to be in 2019 and then eventually end of January) that would see freight trains heading to customs in inland terminals. There was a thread on it here if I remember right. Surely now must be the time to activate it!

 

[Shimbleshanks]

Noting that much of the surviving rail freight traffic via the tunnel is quasi-bulk, such as china clay for paper making, bottled water in cargowaggons, aluminium ingots or steel rails, how many inland terminals (apart from Ripple Lane) are currently set up to deal with regular trainloads of 'mixed' European containers and swap-bodies?

Most of them could if asked - Daventry, East Midlands Gateway, Barking, Eurocentral, Manchester Trafford park etc

 

[4-SUB 4732]

And another thing: hopefully if the Government gets it’s no deal and can state aid, they subsidise freight in order to get more off roads.

 

[Merle Haggard]

Noting that much of the surviving rail freight traffic via the tunnel is quasi-bulk, such as china clay for paper making, bottled water in cargowaggons, aluminium ingots or steel rails, how many inland terminals (apart from Ripple Lane) are currently set up to deal with regular trainloads of 'mixed' European containers and swap-bodies?

RfD put in considerable effort to gain intermodal traffic through the Tunnel, and this was successful; for instance, trains from Italy conveyed tinned foods and white goods. Not sure how EWS, after absorbing RfD, seemed to lose it all, though.
And the building of International Rail Freight Terminals for conventional wagons as well as well as containers. One of the objectives (as stated already above) was inland customs clearance. Only Daventry (DIRFT) seems to be still operating.
Could have been a real opportunity for rail, but it all seemed to wither away under EWS.

 

[Dr Hoo]

RfD put in considerable effort to gain intermodal traffic through the Tunnel, and this was successful; for instance, trains from Italy conveyed tinned foods and white goods. Not sure how EWS, after absorbing RfD, seemed to lose it all, though.
And the building of International Rail Freight Terminals for conventional wagons as well as well as containers. One of the objectives (as stated already above) was inland customs clearance. Only Daventry (DIRFT) seems to be still operating.
Could have been a real opportunity for rail, but it all seemed to wither away under EWS.

Thanks. That was really the point that I was driving at. Just because terminals might have been set up to deal with Tunnel trains 25 years ago (which either withered away or never materialised) doesn't mean that there are legions of spare bright-eyed and bushy-tailed customs inspectors at these places now ready to roll up their sleeves on 1 January 2021. Let alone the international intermodal wagons, paths through Castlefield, 'quarantine areas' and whatnot.

 

[Merle Haggard]

Thanks. That was really the point that I was driving at. Just because terminals might have been set up to deal with Tunnel trains 25 years ago (which either withered away or never materialised) doesn't mean that there are legions of spare bright-eyed and bushy-tailed customs inspectors at these places now ready to roll up their sleeves on 1 January 2021. Let alone the international intermodal wagons, paths through Castlefield, 'quarantine areas' and whatnot.

That's absolutely true.

The unfortunate feature of the IRFTs was that we relied on private enterprise to set up the depots who, we could foresee, might not share our objectives. Getting planning for a big freight depot for lorries is almost impossible; mention 'rail freight' and in becomes 'national infrastructure' and any local objections are ignored - it's certain to get the green light. It was easy to then not use rail very much. And some of the partners thought that by opening the depot, traffic would fall out of the sky.

Funnily enough, and as I think I've posted before, there was widespread ridicule of the choice of Daventry - laughed at for being in the back of beyond, near Long Buckby. But it's been the most successful, the back of beyond maybe, but on the A5 and a couple of miles from M1 J18 - and that's only a couple of miles to J19, M1/M6/A14. The only other one that opened fully, as far as I remember, was Doncaster.

Earlier, not dissimilar examples of getting what you want by being economical with the truth included an extension to the Heinz factory at Willesden - built on railway land and with a rail connection from 'F' (??) sidings (on the down side at a lower level, just before Wembley Cen) and through a door in the end wall. Total traffic - 1 COV AB to show willing.

A further factor around 2000 that killed off conventional wagons through the tunnel was the volume of 'stowaways' that in their journey contaminated loads, particularly bad for food and the resulting claims became unsustainable.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Earlier, not dissimilar examples of getting what you want by being economical with the truth included an extension to the Heinz factory at Willesden - built on railway land and with a rail connection from 'F' (??) sidings (on the down side at a lower level, just before Wembley Cen) and through a door in the end wall. Total traffic - 1 COV AB to show willing.

Sorry to veer off-thread but what a lovely bit of nostalgia. I well remember wading through a 'Heinz' file at Euston House in the mid 1970s that was over an inch thick. I wondered at the time whether the single COV AB had been worth the effort! (It was indeed off Willesden 'F', now at least taking off as the Cappagh spoil terminal after 45 years 'fallow'.)

 

[Merle Haggard]

Sorry to veer off-thread but what a lovely bit of nostalgia. I well remember wading through a 'Heinz' file at Euston House in the mid 1970s that was over an inch thick. I wondered at the time whether the single COV AB had been worth the effort! (It was indeed off Willesden 'F', now at least taking off as the Cappagh spoil terminal after 45 years 'fallow'.)

It was an '/FDF' file. 10/10 to Ray Ahmad (Marketing Manager, Food, Drink and Fertiliser (!!!)) for persistence.

 

[markymark2000]

Something I find interesting is why is all the focus on Dover port queues? What is stopping some of the freight moving to the eurotunnel trains?
I'd also ask how many trucks currently travel overseas either empty or half full (half full including weights). I do wonder if some sort of consolidation centres near Dover and/or Calais could help with companies moving loads. If a company has 2 1/2 full trucks with 1 running Manchester to Paris and another Birmingham to Brussels, you could instead have 1 truck from Manchester, pick up the extra in Birmingham and then in Calais, split the load to go to the respective destinations. Reducing half or empty loads between the south east and Calais could ease the situation. Right now, the cost is there but it's more convenient sometimes to run the 2 half trucks as it speeds up the delivery. At least short term, if you can punish half/empty loads financially, it would mean only the full amounts are moving over here.


Moving to rail freight, of the goods which currently move by train through the tunnel, how much of that is moved by rail (longer distance using the 92s through the tunnel) or trucks (ferry or shuttle train). Is there much china clay, steel rail, aluminium ingots or bottled water going by trucks between Kent and Calais which could be moved onto trains? (goods taken from post #6).

Containers are good but I question do our ports have the capacity for a lot more containers? We know that Felixstowe right now is at capacity and with the excess possibly moving to other container ports, could they be close to capacity? I think the way for containers could be some sort of consolidation depot near Calais as well as near Dagenham or somewhere like that. Move the goods into containers, throw them on a shuttle train over to Calais and then they go from there however they want. I think longer distance container trains don't have much hope because of the loading gauges, paths and available wagons to move goods.

Even with rail freight, I think we need to think about the paths available. Especially paths to container seaports as paths are very hard to get, even with this slight reduction in passenger services, there isn't loads of space for more trains on the core routes.

 

[furnessvale]

Something I find interesting is why is all the focus on Dover port queues? What is stopping some of the freight moving to the eurotunnel trains?
I'd also ask how many trucks currently travel overseas either empty or half full (half full including weights). I do wonder if some sort of consolidation centres near Dover and/or Calais could help with companies moving loads. If a company has 2 1/2 full trucks with 1 running Manchester to Paris and another Birmingham to Brussels, you could instead have 1 truck from Manchester, pick up the extra in Birmingham and then in Calais, split the load to go to the respective destinations. Reducing half or empty loads between the south east and Calais could ease the situation. Right now, the cost is there but it's more convenient sometimes to run the 2 half trucks as it speeds up the delivery. At least short term, if you can punish half/empty loads financially, it would mean only the full amounts are moving over here.


Moving to rail freight, of the goods which currently move by train through the tunnel, how much of that is moved by rail (longer distance using the 92s through the tunnel) or trucks (ferry or shuttle train). Is there much china clay, steel rail, aluminium ingots or bottled water going by trucks between Kent and Calais which could be moved onto trains? (goods taken from post #6).

Containers are good but I question do our ports have the capacity for a lot more containers? We know that Felixstowe right now is at capacity and with the excess possibly moving to other container ports, could they be close to capacity? I think the way for containers could be some sort of consolidation depot near Calais as well as near Dagenham or somewhere like that. Move the goods into containers, throw them on a shuttle train over to Calais and then they go from there however they want. I think longer distance container trains don't have much hope because of the loading gauges, paths and available wagons to move goods.

Even with rail freight, I think we need to think about the paths available. Especially paths to container seaports as paths are very hard to get, even with this slight reduction in passenger services, there isn't loads of space for more trains on the core routes.

Given that approx 70% of the HGVs leaving the UK are empty, having discharged their EU products and having no backload, I don't think consolidation as you propose would achieve much.

 

[SynthD]

The focus is on the process in place now. All those companies have set up around loading a lorry in their depot and contracting/employing the staff to get it somewhere that can deal with a lorry. Changing that to trains is not quick work.

 

[furnessvale]

The focus is on the process in place now. All those companies have set up around loading a lorry in their depot and contracting/employing the staff to get it somewhere that can deal with a lorry. Changing that to trains is not quick work.

Put a container or swap body on the back of a lorry and many people will not even notice the difference. Once it leaves the factory gates, whether it turns left to the motorway or right to the rail container depot is immaterial, PROVIDED the service given is satisfactory.

 

[Bald Rick]

Something I find interesting is why is all the focus on Dover port queues? What is stopping some of the freight moving to the eurotunnel trains?

Dover is understood by the media, and by extension the public, to be the gateway to Europe. It’s also relatively easy to get a photo of the port with ships and the Channel in one frame from above the town.

The eurotunnel terminal at Cheriton ... isn’t.

Exactly the same issues apply with the Eurotunnel lorry shuttles. Which is why half the M20 has been conned off for more than a year.

Is there much china clay, steel rail, aluminium ingots or bottled water going by trucks between Kent and Calais which could be moved onto trains? (goods taken from post #6).

I can’t say definitively, but I’d be astonished if there’s much in the way of rail or aluminium ingots travelling by truck between Kent and Calais.

there could be some mileage in bottled water. But, on principle, I find that the most efficient way to transport Water is through a pipe from your nearest waterworks.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Put a container or swap body on the back of a lorry and many people will not even notice the difference. Once it leaves the factory gates, whether it turns left to the motorway or right to the rail container depot is immaterial, PROVIDED the service given is satisfactory.

In practice it's a bit more complicated than that. Many factories are set up for side-loading of curtained road trailers rather than end-loading of containers and there aren't that many curtain-sided swap bodies. More generally there is a shortage of containers in the right place at the moment for various reasons - stuck full of PPE, diverted to the continent, being used on even busier shipping routes between China and the USA, etc.

 

[Merle Haggard]

Bottled water from France was significant traffic on the train ferry; changed to trainload (in Cargo-Twins) when the Tunnel opened.
There must have been a demand, even though most people have a tap...