Highland Spring siding Blackford

[najaB]

Doesn't seem efficient if only three containers at a time will operate.

I presume, given the length of the sidings, that they were just doing fit checks on the cranes, etc.

 

[fgwrich]

Doesn't seem efficient if only three containers at a time will operate.

I presume, given the length of the sidings, that they were just doing fit checks on the cranes, etc.

Correct, these 3 wagons are just there for trail operations and testing of the site. The full blown Highland Spring trains are likely to be a lot longer.

 

[furnessvale]

Doesn't seem efficient if only three containers at a time will operate.

Actually it was FOUR which makes all the difference!

 

[38Cto15E]

Where will the service be going to once it is up to speed, Mossend?

 

[furnessvale]

Where will the service be going to once it is up to speed, Mossend?

Probably one of the central belt terminals for redistribution onto trains for the south. Could be more than one terminal depending on which FOC(s) work out of Blackford.

 

[D821]

It's great to see freight coming off the road, though it's still slightly absurd that we're sending bottles of water all over the country when we have pipes and taps.

 

[AM9]

Not only for Scotland but the whole UK.

How many years have the proposed railfreight depots at Four Ashes (Wolverhampton) and St Albans been held up by objection after objection? Every MP wants more freight on rail.......as long as the depot is in someone else's constituency.

St Albans railfreight has been resisted because the developer had given themselves so many excuses to use the road link that it was unlikey to operate like a rail freight interchange, instead pushing yet more HGVs onto inadequate major and local roads.

 

[CEN60]

Similar yard planned for West Fraser Plant (Norbord) at Dalcross (Inverness) - Mainline Connection only being installed as part of the Airport Station works. Not sure how long its going to take to actually get the yard built! But its a start!

 

[InOban]

The connection at Blackford was put in at least 3 years ago, pre covid. I'm sure I read that NR's speed rather caught Highland Spring by surprise. Of course Covid devastated the restaurant trade which is their main business so there was no urgency. I think this will be trainloads to a depot in the London area.

 

[Freightmaster]

It's great to see freight coming off the road, though it's still slightly absurd that we're sending bottles of water all over the country when we have pipes and taps.

Council pop!




MARK

 

[vic-rijrode]

It's great to see freight coming off the road, though it's still slightly absurd that we're sending bottles of water all over the country when we have pipes and taps.

Not quite so absurd if you ever taste Northumbria Water through the tap. Tastes like mouthwash - even worse when boiled for a cuppa.

More power to Highland Spring's elbow, I say and hopefully a forerunner.

Maybe a new thread - lines close to a natural spring?

 

[Dunfanaghy Rd]

Actually it was FOUR which makes all the difference!

A pedant writes:
2 Megafret wagons, comprising 4 platforms.
Pat

 

[D821]

Not quite so absurd if you ever taste Northumbria Water through the tap. Tastes like mouthwash - even worse when boiled for a cuppa.

More power to Highland Spring's elbow, I say and hopefully a forerunner.

Maybe a new thread - lines close to a natural spring?

In fairness, I did have a bottled water yesterday in work as the water out of the tap tastes like it may well have come from Northumbria!

 

[Pinus contorta]

In fairness, I did have a bottled water yesterday in work as the water out of the tap tastes like it may well have come from Northumbria!

Likely off thread. There is a huge difference in taste of tap water, because of the additives. Even before you start to think of hard / soft water. The stuff we drink smells of swimming pool chlorine chemicals if we don't let the water 'stand' for a while. We are near the source. Apparently the level diminishes before it gets to 'metropolis' where it doesn't taste as yukky.

 

[och aye]

It has become operational.

Highland Spring splashes out on Perthshire rail freight facility

The hub is being hailed as an example other firms need to follow if Scotland is to become net zero by 2045.

news.stv.tv

It will take 8,000 lorries off the road and cut CO2 emissions by more than 3,000 tonnes every year.

Scotland’s first dedicated rail freight facility in a decade has opened in Perthshire.

The hub, created by water company Highland Spring, is being hailed as an example other firms need to follow if Scotland is to become net zero by 2045.

Highland Spring bottles 500 million litres of water a year.

Until now, the firm has relied on a steady stream of lorries to transport the water.

 

[Sox]

Will the Highland Spring facility be open to other, potential rail freight users?

 

[LSWR Cavalier]

How many lorries are put on the road at the other end to distribute the water? Is rail transport so efficient that the business can be grown more? How much more water could be extracted?

I think it would be much better if people drank tap water instead (use a filter, run the tap for a few seconds if it tastes strange).

According to my map, Blackwater is not in the Highlands!

 

[AM9]

I think it would be much better if people drank tap water instead (use a filter, run the tap for a few seconds if it tastes strange).

Agree whole heartedly with that, - bottled water is an environmentally damaging indulgence.

According to my map, Blackwater is not in the Highlands!

True, but the thread is about the facilities in Blackford, - which is definitely in the Scottish Highlands.

 

[dk1]

Let’s hope it’s a very successful operation for years to come. So good to see initiatives like this.

 

[Perthsaint]

Agree whole heartedly with that, - bottled water is an environmentally damaging indulgence.


True, but the thread is about the facilities in Blackford, - which is definitely in the Scottish Highlands.

It definitely isn't.

 

[AM9]

It definitely isn't.

Compared to Blackwater (I assume that Hampshire was in mind), it is much more Scotland and not that far from whatever the locals there might define as their 'highlands'.

 

[Perthsaint]

Compared to Blackwater (I assume that Surrey was in mind), it is much more Scotland and not that far from whatever the locals there might define as their 'highlands'.

We're agreed that it isn't in the Highlands.

 

[AM9]

We're agreed that it isn't in the Highlands.

To a sassenach or outlander (as you will) it's as near as matters to the highlands where the water is presumably claimed to be drawn from, and certainly not the realtive flatlands of north-east Hampshire.*

* And I've just corrected my earlier post which implies Surrey.

 

[najaB]

To a sassenach or outlander (as you will) it's as near as matters to the highlands where the water is presumably claimed to be drawn from, and certainly not the realtive flatlands of north-east Hampshire.

Indeed. Highland Spring is a brand name, not a claim of origin.

 

[Dr Hoo]

How many lorries are put on the road at the other end to distribute the water? Is rail transport so efficient that the business can be grown more? How much more water could be extracted?

I'm not sure what you mean by "put on the road". Essentially the traffic through the new terminal was largely roaded in containers to longer-established terminals in the Scottish Central Belt and then on trains to Daventry. There is a well established distribution network from Daventry with major names like Tesco and Sainsbury's having depots within the DIRFT complex.

The traffic is now sent by rail from Blackford to the Central Belt where the loads can be attached or transhipped to the same trains that were already being used for the Anglo-Scottish leg.

I am sure that there is scope to increase volumes, add new destinations and so on but that's the icing on the cake.

 

[Oxfordblues]

I'm delighted with this long-awaited development. For 30 years we've been told that wagonload freight is fundamentally uneconomic because of the expense of tripping and shunting. Therefore only full trainloads to a single destination could be accepted. So grain to Burghead, Roseisle, Muir of Ord and Montrose, molasses to Menstrie, aluminium from Fort William and many more flows were handed-over to the road hauliers. Now it seems as if the tables have turned. I get the impression that the trips from Blackford will convey traffic for more than one destination: Daventry is the most obvious, but also possibly Tees Dock, Tilbury, Hams Hall and Seaforth. I wonder if the sections will be shunted at Mossend and/or Coatbridge or whether the containers will be lifted across from the trip to the main train? It opens-up the possibility of other flows being handled in a similar way, such as grain-to and spirits-from Diageo at Cameron Bridge and perhaps a railhead at somewhere like Elgin for the Speyside distilleries.

 

[InOban]

If they are serving more than one destination I would expect separate trains.
BTW have any loaded trains yet left the depot!?

 

[Wynd]

Whats the latest with this? Are the trains using the depot?

Would it not have been an idea to have a northbound access so that existing HML frights could have looped in and out of the terminal, had containers added or removed, and trundled on without any shunting or decoupling?

 

[waverley47]

Whats the latest with this? Are the trains using the depot?

Would it not have been an idea to have a northbound access so that existing HML frights could have looped in and out of the terminal, had containers added or removed, and trundled on without any shunting or decoupling?

The working aren't part of the usual Inverness or Aberdeen runs, which are out-and-back trip workings from the Central Belt.

Instead Highland Spring is envisaged to be its own out-and-back working, with the container flats then martialed into southbound trains.

I don't know about the status of workings, however it's been build on the basis that traffic volume will warrant its own trip working, and therefore there is no need for a nothbound connection

 

[Wynd]

The working aren't part of the usual Inverness or Aberdeen runs, which are out-and-back trip workings from the Central Belt.

Instead Highland Spring is envisaged to be its own out-and-back working, with the container flats then martialed into southbound trains.

I don't know about the status of workings, however it's been build on the basis that traffic volume will warrant its own trip working, and therefore there is no need for a nothbound connection

Highland spring water can be found in every major retail outlet up here in the shire, how does it get here...

To challenge the premise of end-to-end trainload, why cant a trainload be made up as it progresses on its journey?