Way freight

[Herbert S]

Hi everybody,
What is the British term for what US railway people call a "way freight"?
Thanks for any comment.

 

[theblackwatch]

Could you explain what a "way freight" actually is?

 

[telstarbox]

It's a freight train that stops at multiple points on the route to load or unload - the opposite of 'trainload' freight which would be called a 'unit train' in the USA.

 

[G0ORC]

Well, many years ago a pick-up goods or trip working used to perform this function but wagonload simply does not exist now as far as I can see. Speedlink was this kind of operation too but that finished sometime in the 80s or 90s.

No current equivalent as far as I can see...

 

[talltim]

It is still fairly common in mainland Europe, although on the decline there too. I've never quite understood how it is profitable in the US and not very in Europe.
Distance has a part to play in profitability, hence it doesn't exist in the UK, although with the Channel Tunnel Britain is just a part of Europe, railway wise, in theory, but not, seemingly, in practice.

 

[fsmr]

It is still fairly common in mainland Europe, although on the decline there too. I've never quite understood how it is profitable in the US and not very in Europe.
Distance has a part to play in profitability, hence it doesn't exist in the UK, although with the Channel Tunnel Britain is just a part of Europe, railway wise, in theory, but not, seemingly, in practice.

There seem to be a lot more red tape over here in terms of private sidings etc. Whereas many factories and large farmsteads in the states and Europe have a siding with grain store or a few wagons picked up and dropped off, Over here operations such as Guinness at Park royal and Taunton cider couldn't make it pay with Taunton going in the early 90s and Guinness in the late 90s before the whole site closed. Taunton cider used to even stick a van on the back of the china clay train on its way north to cut costs in the later years but it still ended up cheaper by road to Scotland


Our plant in Sweden still has paper rolls delivered but the train runs a number of miles through Lund alongside a cycle path with no automatic crossings or fencing of the tracks, propelling the Cpl of vans with a guy stood on the buffer beam with a flag and 2 way radio
To do that operation in in the uk, would be prohibitive in cost and I dont believe it is any more dangerous over there.
Mind you many trains run at 90 mph plus with no fencing from the road over in Europe

 

[Welshman]

Well, many years ago a pick-up goods or trip working used to perform this function but wagonload simply does not exist now as far as I can see.

AFAIK, the lifting [in the 1960s?]of the obligation on the railways to be the "common carrier" - i.e transport any load no matter how large or small to anywhere, put paid to many small sidings, e.g. for coal merchants or farmers, and the local daily pick-up goods.

Gone are the days when the squire could ring the local stationmaster the day before requesting an extra horsebox be placed in his siding to allow him to transport his thoroughbreds to the race-course!

 

[RichmondCommu]

AFAIK, the lifting [in the 1960s?]of the obligation on the railways to be the "common carrier" - i.e transport any load no matter how large or small to anywhere, put paid to many small sidings, e.g. for coal merchants or farmers, and the local daily pick-up goods.

Gone are the days when the squire could ring the local stationmaster the day before requesting an extra horsebox be placed in his siding to allow him to transport his thoroughbreds to the race-course!

All of this is of course very true but there isn't a single active freight terminal in the whole of the East Midlands. In theory HS2 will create more capacity for rail freight but its hard to see how much scope there is for taking freight off the motorway.

 

[Welshman]

All of this is of course very true but there isn't a single active freight terminal in the whole of the East Midlands. In theory HS2 will create more capacity for rail freight but its hard to see how much scope there is for taking freight off the motorway.

You're right. Once businesses have experienced the "convenience" of door-to-door transport, it is an uphill struggle to encourage them to use rail again. But there have been one of two hopeful exceptions, like the Tesco train and Eddie Stobart's Rail division.

 

[daccer]

It is a moot point now but the total abandonment of Speedlink in the 90's does seem to have been a tad premature. The advent of the Channel Tunnel and the proliferation of FOC's does make one wonder if some sort of wagonload traffic option could have been retained. For a new client looking at rail it must be offputting when you have to book full train loads or nothing.

 

[HowardGWR]

It is a moot point now but the total abandonment of Speedlink in the 90's does seem to have been a tad premature. The advent of the Channel Tunnel and the proliferation of FOC's does make one wonder if some sort of wagonload traffic option could have been retained. For a new client looking at rail it must be offputting when you have to book full train loads or nothing.

Will not automation of transhipment be the only way rail can retrieve 'wagon-load' traffic? Also provision by logistics sub-contractors so that the client is not even aware of how the goods are transported?

 

[D1009]

Didn't EWS try to revive wagonload in the days of Ed Burkhardt? He came from the US, I believe Wisconsin Central. It was largely unsuccessful though, intermodal seems to be the way forward for such traffic nowadays.

 

[talltim]

EWS did run the 'Enterprise' service for a while, I believe this was a form of limited wagonload

 

[G0ORC]

EWS did run the 'Enterprise' service for a while, I believe this was a form of limited wagonload

That's very true - I'd forgotten about that and I was working for EWS in the nineties.

As far as I can remember it never made a great deal of money despite all of the high priority it was given at the time. It seemed to suffer from the same malaise as the Royal Mail traffic which EWS operated and then lost.

In both cases the performance penalties were very severe and since Railtrack (as it was then) didn't seem to think Enterprise or RM (both mainly overnight services) had any sort of priority over engineering works then the performance standards were rarely achieved. Despite the fact that Railtrack paid for the delays, that never helped when the customer had to be recompensed and eventually got so fed up with the service it was(n't) getting both Enterprise and RM traffic ceased to be carried by rail.

Looking from the outside in, as I now do, things have very obviously changed in the relationships between NR and the FOC/TOCs and things appear to be very much better planned and the delay penalty regimes appear to be much more developed than they were then

 

[RichmondCommu]

It is a moot point now but the total abandonment of Speedlink in the 90's does seem to have been a tad premature. The advent of the Channel Tunnel and the proliferation of FOC's does make one wonder if some sort of wagonload traffic option could have been retained. For a new client looking at rail it must be offputting when you have to book full train loads or nothing.

But how could wagonload rail freight ever hope to be profitable in this country? The distances are too short and that’s before you add in the labour cost. Not only that but very little rail freight runs under the English Channel because the demand is simply not there. That’s why Hamburg and Rotterdam are so busy!

 

[HSTEd]

The distance thing is not the primary reason really.
Rail could quite easily be just as cheap as road if a similar infrastructure for local access existed.

In America the railways arrived before industry, thus industrial sites were deployed around railway accessible areas, even today lots of companies have direct access to a railway loading dock.
This was never the case in Britain, requiring expensive transhipment moves.

Unless you can magically make spurs appear to every site that ever wants to send goods, road will win every time.

 

[jnty]

In America the railways arrived before industry, thus industrial sites were deployed around railway accessible areas, even today lots of companies have direct access to a railway loading dock.
This was never the case in Britain, requiring expensive transhipment moves.

Er..it very much was the case - lots of industry had private sidings precisely for this reason. The service, however, proved unprofitable owing to the costs of multiple shunts en-route and the fact that many services ran with much less than a full trainload of wagons.

 

[HSTEd]

Er..it very much was the case - lots of industry had private sidings precisely for this reason. The service, however, proved unprofitable owing to the costs of multiple shunts en-route and the fact that many services ran with much less than a full trainload of wagons.

Then how do you explain the proliferation of goods stations all over the UK?
Such things never existed in the US (to anything like the same extent anyway, they developed things like the High Line in NY to escape them), despite a similar customer base.

Shunts used to be far more time consuming than they once were.
Buffer couplers, vacuum brakes and such things are particularily bad for costs, how many staff does it take to shunt a train using the traditional equipment?

Now we have automatic couplers that can handle any train weight you can care to imagine (C-AKv and EPS brakes reduce coupling to making one train move up against the other and the job is done).
Shunt moves can be made to occur completely automatically now, even on the flat - before we even get onto using hump yards to reduce the need for locomotives.

Now include very fast accelerating cheap to run electrics and you can generate an incredibly low total cost of transport without using up vast numbers of paths running what amount to box-motors. (Or you could just run formations of single car freight multiple units)

So in other words, if the infrastructure still existed, rail could compete, but since the infrastructure is long gone it cannot.

 

[jnty]

Then how do you explain the proliferation of goods stations all over the UK?
Such things never existed in the US (to anything like the same extent anyway, they developed things like the High Line in NY to escape them), despite a similar customer base.

I'm not sure, but as far as I know goods stations were for the sort of things BR were obliged to carry thanks to their common carrier obligations - goods that the US railways just wouldn't bother with.

 

[GB]

Now we have automatic couplers that can handle any train weight you can care to imagine (C-AKv and EPS brakes reduce coupling to making one train move up against the other and the job is done).
Shunt moves can be made to occur completely automatically now, even on the flat - before we even get onto using hump yards to reduce the need for locomotives.

Auto couplers are all well and good, but they don't negate the need to connect pipes, take off hand brakes, perform brake tests, update paperwork... all of which takes time which is why shunting can take along time. Throwing a coupling over a hook is often just as quick as auto couplers as there is no pull test to be done.

Its certainly not a case of having a train with auto couplers, bang them all together then off you go!

 

[HSTEd]

Auto couplers are all well and good, but they don't negate the need to connect pipes, take off hand brakes, perform brake tests, update paperwork...

C-AKv type couplers will connect the air pipes and ECP brake control cables as the coupling engages. Hand brakes engagement will not necessarily be neccesary for shunting in an ECP type system - as the airreservoirs of all vehicles remain fully charged after the pipes are detached and will remain charged for a significant length of time.
You could also attach vehicles in loading dock sidings to a shore compressor and a PC if required to allow them to be prepared for joining a train rapidly.

I have also seen proposed rigs which would use the ECP bus to wind the handbrakes on/off remotely with an electric motor.
Brake tests are also simplified by the brake systems in the vehicles reporting anomalies to the control unit on the fly.

And finally, why is a very highly paid driver wasting time filling out paperwork? What is in the paperwork? Remember the train data bus will allow every vehicle to continuously report its identity and status. That should simplify any manifest details (since the trains onboard computer could automatically report what vehicles are in what positions to control without the driver even doing anything)

aall of which takes time which is why shunting can take along time. Throwing a coupling over a hook is often just as quick as auto couplers as there is no pull test to be done.

Its certainly not a case of having a train with auto couplers, bang them all together then off you go!

Well multiple units seem to manage to do it rather quickly, and the crew does not even have to leave the cab in certain circumstances. (If the shunting train is relatively short, as a 'pickup' working would be the driver can lean from the cab or use an appropriate positioned camera during the 'propelling' move).
As you would have independant control over every single vehicle's brakes thanks to the ECP system you could attempt to pull away with only the newly coupled vehicles' brakes applied, if the train does not part you can assume the train is ready to go - you could then proceed to move off without stopping again.