Cargo Rail Express

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The Carex trains were to be based on the TGV Postal (illustration) used from 1984 to 2015 and operate across borders.

Cargo Rail Express (Euro Carex) is a group of companies that wanted to offer a network of high-speed rail freight transport. This should Nachtsprung intra-European connections airfreight replace flights.

history

prehistory

Even with the introduction of the TGV -Hochgeschwindigkeitsverkehrs in France in 1981, there were plans for high-speed mail trains that with the 7 October 1984 to June 2015 TGV postal trains on were realized. Building on this traffic, the SNCF and La Poste decided to found Cargo Rail Express to transport goods across Europe with TGVs in CEP traffic . The central hub was to be Charles de Gaulle Airport near Paris, from which Great Britain, the Benelux countries, Switzerland, Germany, Italy and Spain were to be reached. Air freight pallets and containers should be transported over distances of 300 to 800 km.

A night flight ban at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport prevents the expansion of air freight traffic there.

Establishing the company

In February 2006, Roissy Carex was founded as a non-profit organization. The founding members included SNCF, La Poste, FedEx , TNT Post , the Paris airport company ADP , the airport service provider WFS and the airline AirFrance-KLM Cargo . In October 2006, a “feasibility study for the implementation of an express rail freight service at Charles de Gaulle Airport” was commissioned, which should be available by November 2010. The study expected costs for rolling stock and terminals as well as operation from 2010 to 2012 totaling one billion euros, which should be financed by a public-private partnership . With an average transport price of 370 euros per pallet, an average occupancy rate of 62 percent was expected. According to this, 889 air freight pallets should be transported Monday to Thursday, 750 on Friday, 571 on Saturday and 400 on Sunday. An annual volume of 270,000 pallets or 700,000 t of freight was expected.

On November 29, 2007, London Carex was founded as a wholly owned subsidiary of Groupe Eurotunnel SA . In the same year, HST Cargo, based at Schiphol Airport , was founded and joined the group in 2010 as Amsterdamcarex . The Belgian subsidiary Liegecarex was founded in Liège on March 21, 2007 . These three organizations met on May 15th of the same year to negotiate the creation of the Euro-Carex association. This was officially founded on April 26, 2009. In addition to the three above, Lyoncarex, which was founded on September 24, 2007 and is based at Lyon Saint-Exupéry Airport , also joined.

Operations should start as early as 2010. Initially, Roissy was to connect Lyon, Aix-Marseille, Strasbourg, Brussels, Liège and Amsterdam. London, Cologne, Frankfurt and Bordeaux should follow in 2012. An extension of the network to Italy and Spain was considered.

In mid-2007, the Walloon Region (Region) commissioned a feasibility study to check whether Liège Airport could be connected to the Carex network.

In 2008, the members of the Euro-Carex consortium signed a letter of intent in which the start of the first phase of commercial operations was planned for March 2012.

In the same year, the French network operator RFF submitted a study into free train paths. The maintenance work previously carried out at night is compatible with Carex traffic at night. A second investigation looked at the connection of the terminals to the routes.

At the end of November 2008, Cologne-Carex joined the Carex association with Cologne / Bonn Airport and the UPS and Fedex hubs. The project was delayed due to a recession and the associated decline in air freight volume.

Because of the ecological advantage and the possibility of avoiding night flights , the French state agreed to support the establishment of terminals in Paris and Lyon with 170 million euros. The European Union also agreed to support the construction of the terminal in Liège with over one million euros from the TEN-T program.

Real progress cannot be seen on the websites of the individual local consortia (see under web links). If at all, meetings of the respective boards or general assemblies, the election of new representatives and, in some cases, the commissioning or presentation of supplementary studies of lesser importance are listed there for the years between 2010 and 2018. Construction starts or a vehicle order are neither mentioned there nor in the (German-speaking) specialist press. In this respect, even a medium-term start of operations is unlikely.

First test run

A first test run took place on March 21, 2012 with a TGV Postal from Lyon Saint-Exupéry Airport via Paris-Charles-de-Gaulles Airport and through the Eurotunnel to St Pancras station in London. The train had a freight capacity of 120 tons of freight, in sections it was pulled by two diesel locomotives. The train had left Lyon Saint Exupery Airport at 16:42 the day before and continued via Paris CDG and Calais Frethun, where it arrived at 10:25 p.m. Due to a lack of approval, the train was pulled through the Eurotunnel and over High Speed ​​1 . The train arrived in London at 1:24 a.m., earlier than planned.

The return trip started at 11:40 a.m. After an eleven hour stop in Kent, the train returned to the Channel Tunnel at 12:02 am the next day.

Planned route network and terminals

The first stage of operation should start in 2017 or 2018 with connections from Paris to London, Amsterdam, Liège, Frankfurt and Lyon (as of March 2012). When the London - Paris CDG connection went into operation, the company expected a utilization of up to 90 percent.

Then Bordeaux, Aix-Marseille and Strasbourg should follow. There were also plans to expand the network to Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Bologna, Milan, Turin, Cologne and Berlin from 2020.

Terminals should be there:

The journey time between Lyon and London, with a stop in Paris, should be five to six hours. For the route from Amsterdam-Schiphol to Cologne / Bonn, the trains should take 4 hours and 40 minutes, from Roissy to London 130 minutes and from Liège to Cologne / Bonn 75 minutes.

Terminals, which should cost 13 million euros each in 2007, must, according to the operating company, be located in the immediate vicinity of a high-speed line, an airport and a motorway. The systems should each have four tracks, if possible, with two 400 m long and 20 m wide central platforms.

There should be two terminals at Paris-Roissy Airport: The southern terminal on the edge of the airport will provide connections to Marseille, Lyon and Strasbourg. The northern terminal will be close to a Fedex hub and handle traffic to London, Liège, Amsterdam and Cologne. In London, a terminal is planned east of the city, at Barking .

Planned vehicles

Several train models were examined in the feasibility study. TGV and ICE multiple units were available immediately, while Thalys and Eurostar vehicles would have had to wait three or five years.

At the end of 2006, negotiations began with Alstom and Siemens about the delivery of vehicles. They proposed freight versions of their respective high-speed multiple units, TGV Euroduplex and Velaro . At the beginning of 2007, the company intended to buy a total of 20 TGV trains for a total of 625 million euros. At the end of 2008, eight trains should initially be procured for the first expansion stage. In 2012, the tender was finally put out to tender for up to 25 high-speed trains with speeds of at least 300 km / h, which can be loaded with air freight roll containers. The loading times should take a maximum of 15 minutes in total. The costs for the first 8 vehicles should amount to 200 million euros. The start of operations was planned for the years 2015 to 2017.

The 200 m long Velaro Cargo from Siemens should be able to reach speeds of up to 320 km / h and transport 144 t of freight or 60 air freight containers .

The actual railway operation should be put out to tender.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Keith Barrow: Last post for French high-speed freight as postal TGVs bow out. In: International Railway Journal . June 29, 2015, accessed July 14, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Fret GV plans Europe-wide high-speed network. In: Verkehrsrundschau. January 10, 2008.
  3. ↑ La Poste wants to expand services to the entire TGV network. Article dated June 18, 2007.
  4. ↑ Paris wants express trains for freight. In: Financial Times Germany. January 7, 2008.
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Mike Bent: The Dawn Of High Speed ​​Rail Freight Services . In: Railvolution . No. 2 , 2012, ZDB -ID 2508982-1 , p. 24-26 .
  6. ^ By Ralf Klingsieck: Air France Cargo adjusts its fleet . In: German logistics newspaper . No. 49 , April 22, 2008.
  7. ↑ a b c Eurocarex: Project of high-speed European rail freight service connected to airports and logistic areas  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 4.4 MB), December 2011.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.eurocarex.com  
  8. ↑ Timon Heinrici: Fast parcels by rail . In: German logistics newspaper . October 28, 2006.
  9. ↑ a b Ralf Klingsieck: Freight TGV should start in 2010 . In: German logistics newspaper . No. 8 , January 17, 2007, p. 9 .
  10. ↑ a b Eurocarex: "Major Steps" .
  11. ↑ Reports International . In: Eisenbahn-Revue International . No. 10 , 2006, ISSN  1421-2811 , pp. 507 .
  12. ↑ Liège wants to join the freight TGV network . In: German logistics newspaper . No. 94 , August 9, 2007.
  13. ↑ a b c d e f Night express network is taking shape . In: German logistics newspaper . No. 143 , November 27, 2008, p. 13 .
  14. ↑ a b Research Information System : Intermodal Linking of Air Freight and Rail Freight Transport , Status: February 28, 2013, accessed on March 4, 2013.
  15. ↑ Representation of the EU in Belgium: A new intermodal platform for Liège Airport  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , January 3, 2013.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / ec.europa.eu  
  16. ^ Editing: France / Great Britain: TGV Post as a demo train for EuroCarex to London. In: Eurailpress. March 26, 2012, accessed July 14, 2020 .
  17. ↑ rail.co.uk: International Railway History Made at St Pancras as a Cargo Carrying TGV Makes First Visit to the station 22 March 2012 found.
  18. ↑ Railway Magazin: 'La Poste' visits St Pancras ( Memento of the original from January 30, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . March 21, 2012. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.railwaymagazine.co.uk
  19. ^ A b c Keith Fender: Euro Carex presents plans for high speed freight. In: Modern Railways. Vol. 69, No. 764, 2012, ISSN  0026-8356 , p. 8.
  20. ↑ Alexander Gediehn: High Speed ​​Cargo by Rail ( Memento of the original from June 12, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 10.3 MB), April 14, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / ctf2010.unizar.es