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Tesco to increase its use of rail freight

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matchmaker

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It's certainly noticeable how many Tesco lorries are no longer on the A9 between Perth and Inverness because of the daily return rail service. The forerunner of that was the "Safeway Flyer".
 
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Strat-tastic

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You are confusing some marketing people trying to be clever with wordplay, and possibly being a bit too clever, with deliberately trying to hide something or mislead.

To me Less Co2 immediately says Tesco but then I’m aware of the connection. I did once have a chat with a passing jogger who was asking which train I was waiting to photograph and we got onto the Tesco Express. He had some knowledge of the railway but wasn’t an enthusiast and he thought the Less Co2 train was to do with nuclear power, i.e. a greener type of energy, and hadn’t connected LessCo with Tesco.
I always got the Tesco link but being a chemist I always said less C O 2. But it's only by this thread it now occurs to me that it's supposed to rhyme Tesco Less-Co (too?).
 

Jozhua

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Btw, most freight customers border the existing network - building a new network for freight would not be as effective as many think. Releasing capacity on the existing network is the best thing we can do for freight.

A train leaving Euston HS2 every 3 minutes....? (just checking). It seems crazy that these will be filled.
You're serving London - Birmingham, Manchester, Derby, Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds, York, Newcastle, Preston, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Crewe and more - quite easy to see how these will be filled up.
And unfortunately the politicans neither.


More space on WCML South, I agree with you, but HS2 doesn't get you to Felixstowe, Southampton or the WCML north of Crewe to Scotland nor through Manchester Piccadilly so I fail to see where the freight capacity increase is coming from unless we believe that covid will see a need for fewer passenger trains on the rest of the network at all times of the day to allow for more freight trains.
Of course there will need to be changes to the existing network, but it's much easier to squeeze freight in with slower regional/local services than fast intercity ones.

Capacity is set to double/triple in areas which no longer have to accommodate the high speed services - this leaves more room for freight to be fit in. Now there may still be a requirement for a passing loop here or there, but that's a fairly simple provision versus adding entire extra lines just for freight.
But then you end up in the circle of 'hs2 is pointless without other schemes which are pointless without hs2'.
At some point you have to break the circle to make progress. Build one and it makes the other more worthwhile.
100%
 

edwin_m

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Agreed, my point is without schemes away from HS2, including the ones you highlighted and others, it doesn't matter whether its Tesco, Asda, Sainsburys, Morrisions or anyone else you care to mention without those schemes HS2 by itself doesn't get you more Freight space except between Willesden and Basford Hall.
Felixstowe to Nuneaton and similar routes mainly carry a few regional passenger trains per hour at 100mph or less. So the double track routes are generally able to carry more with local enhancements to pinch points such as Soham to Ely - some of these are major schemes in their own right but not comparable with building a whole new route. The freight on Felixstowe-Nuneaton is international, where a large proportion is already on rail, so future growth may be relatively small.

By contrast, the WCML is important for domestic intermodal traffic, which is where extra will freight trains will be needed if Tesco and similar customers increase their use of rail. It will also be one of the main "beneficiaries" if the proposals to re-purpose EMUs for parcel movements take off, as it links several of the major cities that parcels will need to travel between. The WCML has intensive service of 100mph and 125mph passenger trains and without HS2 will continue to do so. Even with four tracks capacity is an issue all along the route, not just at specific places, so providing for extra freight needs a new route either for the freight or for some of the existing passenger trains - which is what HS2 does.
 

BRX

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Chiller wagons to transport fruit and veg from Spain is an excellent use of rail. 15 weekly trains from Spain to Barking

Is 15 the number they are intending to increase it to? That's quite a big increase on what's running at present. My understanding is that there are plenty of paths through the tunnel but not many on HS1. I've been wondering if the "Spain to Scotland" trains that are mentioned in the press releases will therefore use the 'classic lines' instead - but the press release text is very unclear on whether there's really going to be a direct spain/scotland service, or just some additional domestic services to convey some containers onwards from Barking.
 

InOban

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In the past the main issue was getting reliable transits through France. I don't think that the unions liked private sector freight trains. Incidentally, is freight allowed on the Spanish High Speed lines (which are standard gauge ) or does everything have to be transshipped at the border?

Within the UK, I think that rail already dominates the traffic from the major ports to the Midland distribution hubs. Some of the container traffic will be going direct to the end user - say car parts - and I can't see rail effectively competing for this.

Outbound from the hubs nearly of of England can be reached out and home within a driver's permitted hours, while if rail were used there would be further transfers. However Scotland can't be served within hours, so using rail to a Scottish hub becomes viable. Even within Scotland, the supermarkets in the far north are too far and using a train to Inverness isn't entirely greenwash
 

hwl

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In the past the main issue was getting reliable transits through France. I don't think that the unions liked private sector freight trains. Incidentally, is freight allowed on the Spanish High Speed lines (which are standard gauge ) or does everything have to be transshipped at the border?

Within the UK, I think that rail already dominates the traffic from the major ports to the Midland distribution hubs. Some of the container traffic will be going direct to the end user - say car parts - and I can't see rail effectively competing for this.

Outbound from the hubs nearly of of England can be reached out and home within a driver's permitted hours, while if rail were used there would be further transfers. However Scotland can't be served within hours, so using rail to a Scottish hub becomes viable. Even within Scotland, the supermarkets in the far north are too far and using a train to Inverness isn't entirely greenwash
Most of the supermarkets (ASDA being a bit of a low outlier for its size) have an extensive network of Regional distribution centres with many products not going through "midlands" national distribution centres (general merchandise /clothing /slow moving and some chilled /frozen is more likely to go though ambient or temperature controlled NDCs). Hence many drivers being able to do two RDC-Store-RDC journeys per shift in more densely populated parts of the country (e.g. Tesco and Sainsburys each having 4+ RDCs that cover the M25 area).
Bread and Milk will often be delivered direct to store by the supplier.
Only Tesco (Livingstone) and Sainsburys (East Kilbride) have RDCs north of the Border.
 

InOban

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Asda has an RDC in Grangemouth. Indeed all the supermarket chains (morrisons, lidl aldi coop )deliver to their Scottish stores from Scottish depots.
 

InOban

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The Asda depot is next the rail-served Malcolm facility and the Coop is in EuroCentral which is next Mossend.
The point is that most of these regional depots and their distribution networks would be difficult to serve using rail, so there is a limit to the ability of rail to take over the business.
Now if heavy vehicles were charged Road tax corresponding to the damage they do to our roads (it increases rapidly with axle load), then things might change.
Incidentally one of the first Freightliner flows, back in the day, carried meat for Sainsbury's from Aberdeen to London. I used to see it going round the Edinburgh Sub at about 10pm. About 55 years ago.
 

eslcma

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All the retailers with DCs in Scotland use Rail. Some directly like Tesco and Asda, other indirectly through other shippers. Not everything is exactly what it says on the tin.
 

yorkie

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Just a reminder to keep this thread factual please.

I've moved a post (and a reply to it) from here into the Speculative Ideas section; we do welcome speculative ideas but we do ask that they are posted exclusively in that section, thanks :)
 

mark-h

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Incidentally one of the first Freightliner flows, back in the day, carried meat for Sainsbury's from Aberdeen to London. I used to see it going round the Edinburgh Sub at about 10pm. About 55 years ago.
At that time there would be no goods carried to Scotland for Sainsbury's as they did not have any Scottish retail operations until 1984 when the SavaCentre (joint venture with BHS) opened at Cameron Toll which the Edinburgh Sub passes.
 

Bald Rick

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At that time there would be no goods carried to Scotland for Sainsbury's as they did not have any Scottish retail operations until 1984 when the SavaCentre (joint venture with BHS) opened at Cameron Toll which the Edinburgh Sub passes.

Hence why @InOban said from Aberdeen to London!
 

mark-h

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Hence why @InOban said from Aberdeen to London!
I was giving context (and fully understood InOban's post)- some of the large chains reached Scotland relatively late. Tesco did not have much of a presence until they bought WM Low in the mid 90s.

A distribution network is more efficient when the flow is balanced to minimise empty milage. I would assume that Freightliner would have arranged some other loads going to Aberdeen as Sainsbury's would not have had anything to transport North at that time. Do Tesco, and the other supermarkets, move Scottish products to England using their rail services?
 

InOban

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Since the UK imports much more than it exports, most container trains carry a lot of empty containers in one direction. I think some whisky and other spirits may go South, perhaps beer.
 

Bald Rick

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Since the UK imports much more than it exports, most container trains carry a lot of empty containers in one direction. I think some whisky and other spirits may go South, perhaps beer.

Certainly the former especially in the August-November peak export season.

they do, but IIRC not on the Tesco trains. And no I’m not saying which trains either!
 
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