Week 40 - September 2003

The German rail safety and competition authority Eisenbahn-Bundesamt (EBA) on 26 September gave notice to the German Railway (Deutsche Bahn AG – DB AG) to not take out higher prices for network access related services towards railway undertakings outside the DB AG Group, as towards DB AG owned companies.

The infrastructure manager DB Netz AG, that belongs to the DB AG group, is publishing a so called article catalogue for certain services, where the prices for certain network access related services, as signal books, operational regulations, handbooks and catalogues, are fixed. According to inquiries of the EBA is DB Netz demanding an up to 100% higher compensation from other railway undertakings as from the companies belonging to the DB AG group.

EBA sees in this practise an offence against the right of a non-discriminatory use of the open railway infrastructure.

The British Strategic Rail Authority (SRA) on 24 September announced that it has signed a franchise agreement with FGK, a consortium of FirstGroup plc and Keolis SA, for the new TransPennine Express franchise, following the signing of Heads of Terms last month. The franchise will operate services on principal inter-city routes across the North of England. An order for new trains for use on the TransPennine services was also signed with Siemens (see separate article).

The new franchise is planned to commence in early 2004. It will run for eight years with the option to extend for up to a further five years. Improvements confirmed by the signing of the franchise, which incorporates a total private sector investment of around GBP 260 million, will include:

• The introduction of a new fleet of 100 mile/h diesel multiple units leading to increased capacity, improved service quality, performance and reliability of rail services on these routes. The new trains will be maintained at two new purpose built depots in Manchester and York

• Upgrades to all 30 stations on the TransPennine Express routes, including real time information and improved security, toilet, ticketing and waiting facilities

• 200 extra jobs created in the North of England

• Introduction of a new timetable in December 2004, which delivers a regular hourly service pattern for longer periods of the day, together with some increases in frequency and reductions in journey times. In addition to providing increases in capacity, the new timetable also supports the growth objectives of Manchester International Airport

• Initiatives such as a new customer contact centre, dedicated telephone links and add-on-fares to improve integration with other transport modes

• Improvements to the Passenger's Charter commitment that compensates passengers for the late running of individual trains

FGK is a consortium of FirstGroup plc and Keolis SA. FirstGroup plc currently operates the First Great Eastern, First Great Western and First North Western franchises. Keolis SA in consortium with Go-Ahead Group plc as part of GOVIA, is the incumbent franchisee of South Central Trains and Thameslink Rail.

Franchise payments in million GBP:

• 2003/2004:        28,6

• 2004/2005:        72,9

• 2005/2006:        78,7

• 2006/2007:        86,7

• 2007/2008:        81,8

• 2008/2009:        78,9

• 2009/2010:        77,5

• 2010/2011:        76,3

• 2011/2012:        55,8

GEFCO GmbH & Co KG in German Mörfelden, a subsidiary of the worldwide GEFCO logistics group with seat in Paris, has started a rail freight service between Germany and Greece. As from 13 September will a container train of 30 TEU (twenty-foot units), which corresponds to 33 pallets per TEU, be loaded every Saturday in Mannheim with destination Thessaloniki. Exported are chemicals, high-valued construction materiel, truck spare parts, as well as household-, sanitary- and hygiene articles. To the import articles are steel products, wine and spirituous, furniture components and return logistics.

As from the 4^th quarter will GEFCO increase the offer to consolidated cargo transport of dangerous cargo. The transport time is 4 days from terminal to terminal, and is thereby considerably longer than by truck, but cheaper. The loads are delivered within 24 hours of arrival all over the Greek mainland.

GEFCO operates from 19 cities throughout Germany, and is partner for the CargoConcept on 11 thereof. GEFCO offers with 1.100 co-workers a large network of international transport lines. Daily some 800 transports are carried out in the local traffic, 300 transports in national traffic and 100 transports in international long-distance traffic.

The GEFCO Logistic Group in 2002 had a worldwide turnover of 2,6 billion EUR, with 300 subsidiaries in 50 countries.

A new intermodal freight interchange is to be built at Goole in East Yorkshire. Goole Intermodal Terminal will be formed by a partnership between British Waterways, East Riding of Yorkshire Council, EWS, Wykeland Group and Danbirt Shipping Limited.

The Goole Intermodal Terminal partnership will design, build and operate a 26-acre multimodal terminal, which will link and make interchange easy and efficient for freight by rail, road, barge and ship. The terminal will be the further-most inland intermodal freight transhipment facility in Great Britain to include all three modes of surface transport. This will offer customers and users of the terminal unrivalled choice and flexibility. Goole Intermodal Terminal will be built in stages and will be able to offer bespoke handling operations and warehouses. Stage one of the terminal is expected to be operational by mid-2004.

With the arrival of the working time directive, interchanges, such as Goole, will be vital in order to maximise exceptional delivery performance.

The Board of the French Railway and logistics group, SNCF Group presented the results for the first half-year of 2003 on 24 September. The overall economic situation has effected the result strongly.

The consolidated turnover is stable over the period at 11.047 million EUR, a decrease of 1,5% compared with the same period last year. All in all a negative result of 242 milllion EUR, and that is a reduction of 75 million EUR compared to 2002. The investment rate was maintained on a high level.

The passenger area increased the turnover with 4% to 5.534 million EUR, and that is and increase of 0,7% compared with 2002.

The total freight branch was strongly affected by an unfavourable economic situation and the social movements during the spring. The turnover decreased by 3 % to 3.121 million EUR (- 4 % compared with the same period in 2002). This fall relates mainly to the activities SNCF Freight (Fret SNCF) and "Combined Transport".

Finally, the turnover of the branch "Infrastructure" dropped by 3% to 2.392 million EUR.

When the Swiss railway system Rail 2000 goes into operation on 12 December 2004, according to schedule, will the trains on the new constructed line between Mattstetten – Rothrist in the first phase use the conventional signalling system. The new signalling and train safety system ETCS will be taken into operation in a second phase. This will however have no obvious effect for the customers.

The Swiss rail operator SBB decided already last year that the new line of Rail 2000 between Mattstetten and Rothrist is being equipped with 2 from each other independent safety systems; a conventional system with outdoor signals and the new European Train Control System – ETCS. At the same time was decided that the trains would be operated with a maximum speed of 160 km/h in the first year of operation on the new line. With ETC-operation will a maximum speed of 200 km/h be possible.

The transport time between Zürich and Bern will be reduced to less than 1 hour through the new line. The timetable for Rail 2000 as from 12 December 2004 foresees 58 minutes, compared to the present 69 minutes, and when the ETCS is in operation to 56 minutes. Due to the delay in delivery of ETCS-components through the industry, the comprehensive re-equipment works on the rolling stock for the ETCS-operation, and the thereof following education of locomotive drivers whereby the originally foreseen fixed day for the start of the ETCS operation is extremely ambitious.

A consortium composed of FirstGroup plc and Keolis SA has acquired a license to operate the trans-Pennine network from 2004 which covers the principal inter-city routes across the north of England. On 24 September Siemens Transportation Systems signed a contract with this consortium to supply up to 56 three-car diesel trains, which will be used on these routes from 2006. The order, also including maintenance services and two depots, is worth around € 500 million.

The Siemens trains, called Desiros, will be capable of speeds of 160 km/h. They are equipped with powerful diesel traction systems (561 kW per car), ensuring especially good acceleration even on rising gradients in the Pennines, a chain of hills in the north of England. First/Keolis intends to reduce travelling times by up to 10 minutes per route.

The trains have 183 seats (15 of which are in 1st Class) and are based on the Class 360 trains supplied by Siemens for the south of England. Air-conditioning, modern passenger information systems, video monitoring and a special wheelchair area are just some of their main features. They are scheduled to start passenger service in spring 2006 on trans-Pennine routes between the cities of Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, York, Hull, Sheffield and Newcastle.

Siemens is also responsible for maintenance, fuelling and cleaning in two new depots to be built, which will provide 100 new jobs. The two depots are required in order to ensure the specified level of availability, in view of the extended network of routes and the substantial number of trains. The main depot will include a train washing plant and will be located in Manchester. The second, smaller depot will be in York.

As with the previous Desiro trains which Siemens is currently delivering for regional routes in southern and eastern England, the trans-Pennine trains will be thoroughly tested at Siemens’ test track at Wegberg-Wildenrath near Düsseldorf. This allows the trains’ reliability to be proven before they are delivered to the UK.

On 22 September 2003 the British rail freight operator English Welsh & Scottish Railway – EWS launched another new service from the Port of Southampton for intermodal customers. The new service is part of a major on-going project by EWS in connection with some of the UK’s largest retailers and involves the movement of 10.000 containers per annum. The train will operate daily to the EWS terminal in London at Willesden. From London EWS can provide customers with a wide range of same day and next day rail deliveries to locations across Britain.

The new service is the fourth that EWS has introduced to serve the Port of Southampton in under a year, in direct response to growing customer demand.

On 20 September the Assistant Railway Minister of Russia Vadim Morosov, and the Director Generals of 26 European railway undertakings signed a resolution to the “Perspectives of the railway as guaranty for mobility in an enlarged European Union”. The aim is that the European railways are better at utilisation the different networks and to strengthen the cooperation.

The German Railway CEO Hartmut Mehdorn invited the railway managers to Berlin. The German Federal Minister of Transport Manfred Stolpe and the EU-Commissioner responsible for the Enlargement Günter Verheugen also participated in the meeting. 

This was the third time of such a meeting since 2001. This year the fast integration of the railway systems in the Accession countries was one of the main subjects. Thereby should the advantage be used, of the large coverage of the railway network in the accession countries for the development of an economically competitive and service-orientated railway offer.

As the rail freight has an average market share of 38% in the accession countries, the new EU-countries should not do the same mistakes as the West-European countries made some years ago, with negligence of the investments in the railway systems.

Everything is now focussed on using the advantages of the different long-distance routes in order to ensure an increase of market shares.

• 7^th – 9^th of October in Jönköping (SE): Nordic Rail fair and conference. The conference starts with the theme: “The EU's and Nordic Region's Transport Policy”, then there is a NIM seminar Open Nordic Goods Market, and the second days there is a passenger transport track as well as a freight transport track. For further information please have a look at the Nordic Rail website: http://www.elmia.se/nordicrail/

• 15^th of October in Brussels (BE): ProM@in Workshop “Outsourcing in Railway Maintenance, - Lessons learned and strategies to succeed”. ProM@in is a Project funded by the European Community, Directorate General Energy and Transport under the "Competitive and Sustainable Growth" programme. The aim of workshop is to Focus on lessons learned (both positive and negative) and ways forward; What are the best practices?; Set up a framework for analysing how and when to outsource; How can good relationships between Infrastructure managers and contractors be created?; and Give input to booklet on the topic. For further information please contact Kari Hollum, SINTEF Industrial Management on e-mail: Kari.Hollum@SINTEF.no.

• 16^th of October in Brussels (BE): Workshop on “Deregulation and Transport Safety in Rail”, a part of the Safety related consequences of deregulation in transport - project. The project's aim is to develop a better decision basis for deregulation and safety in transport. The workshop includes Deregulation and safety; Experiences from USA; Are there "best practice" solutions? by Professor Ian Savage, Northwestern University USA. From law to work instructions; managing safety rules in Dutch (and European) railways, by Professor Andrew Hale, University of Delft, Netherlands. Safety impacts of railway deregulation in Great Britain, by Professor Andrew W. Evans, University College of London. Does deregulation of transport affect transport safety? A systematic review of evidence from evaluation studies, with Dr. Rune Elvik, The Institute of Transport Economics (TØI), Norway. And; Liability in a deregulated society with Dr. Zandvoort (Delft University of Technology, Netherlands). For further information please contact.Kari Hollum, SINTEF Industrial Management on e-mail: Kari.Hollum@SINTEF.no

• 23^rd of October in Newark NJ (US): "Practical air rail intermodality". One-day workshop organised by the International Air Rail Organisation. For more information and registration, please visit the IARO website at www.iaro.com/events.htm or register through events@oakhillmedia.com

• 4^th – 6^th of November in Rotterdam (NL): Intermodal Transport & Logistics Exhibition and Conference. This years ITL is again taking place on Ahoy in Rotterdam. The conference include topics as Security and the intermodal supply chain, Combined barge/rail solutions, Eastern Europe’s intermodal infrastructure, Trans European Rail Freight Networks, Short distance intermodal solutions and Life after the LKW Maut. For further information please visit www.intermodal-events.com

• 25^th – 27^th of November in Budapest (HU): CEE Rail 2003, Central and Eastern Europe’s leading rail strategy event. Speakers are ministers and managers of the CEE countries, together with representatives of the EU-Commission, the World Bank and the European Investment Bank – EIB. The Central & Eastern European rail industry is undergoing a massive restructuring process. Infrastructure is being separated from operations; rehabilitation and modernisation are key priorities. As an increasing number of rail companies in the region undertake the privatisation process, it is crucial to fully understand the commercial benefits of moving from state owned operations towards privately owned network. Railway development across Europe, and the Central and Eastern European region in particular, has top priority for the European Commission. As the industry works towards creating an integrated rail transport network, it is vital to understand the different roles in its development. For further information on the conference please have a look at www.rail-world.com.

• 3^rd – 5^th December in Basel (CH): Eisenbahn Technologie- ET 2003 - 7th International Exhibition of Equipment, Systems and Services for Mainline and Urban Railways. For further information please have a look at: http://www.railexhibitions.com.

• 26^th – 28^th of January 2004 in Amsterdam (NL): EuroRail 2004, Europe’s rail CEO conference takes place again for the 7^th time. Among the speakers are; Dominique Bussereau, State Secretary for Transport and the Sea, France; Louis Gallois, President, SNCF; Johannes Ludewig, Executive Director, Community of European Railways; Frank Bernard, MD, Thalys International; Karel Vinck, CEO, SNCB; Keld Sengelov, CEO, DSB; Dr Klaus Kremper, Managing Director, Railion; and, Anton Walk, MD, International Business Group, Nederlandse Spoorwegen. For further information please have a look at the EuroRail 2004 website!