The Freight Route Utilisation Strategy is a Route Utilisation Strategy in the United Kingdom, published by Network Rail in March 2007. It is one of only two (the future Network RUS is the other) which have the perspective of the network as whole. It was included in a map published by the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) as established in May 2007. As with other RUSs, the Freight RUS took into account a number of responses to a Draft for Consultation. including the ORR.
To quote the Foreword: "Rail freight...has grown rapidly in the last 10 years...this strategy forecasts further growth of up to 30 percent – the equivalent of an extra 240 freight trains per day – over the next ten years . For this additional demand to be met by road freight...would lead to around an extra 1.5 million lorry journeys on the roads each year."
The study recommends a number of approaches and enhancements to the network. Like other strategies in this series, recommendations are divided into short-term (Control Period 3, CP3, to March 2009), medium-term (CP4, to March 2014), and long-term (CP5, thereafter).
The chief recommendation is probably the enhancement of the loading gauge from Southampton and the East Anglia coast ports to West Coast Main Line (WCML), as most growth is expected in the carriage of deep-sea containers and coal for the electricity-generating industry, mainly for Trent valley and Aire valley power stations. Much coal is imported via the east coast ports.
A key issue is the loading gauge of routes for freight in sea-going (9' 6" in height, 2500 mm in width) containers. Such loads are accommodated on routes cleared to W10 on standard wagons. W12 is only slightly wider than W10, and the Freight RUS recommends that where structures are renewed the starting assumption should be that they are cleared to W12.
Unlike passenger services, which over the course of a day tended to have comparable flows in both directions, freight movements are unidirectional. Even though rolling stock usually needs to return to the original departure point, this may be via a different route, and, problems arising from fully loaded trains and steep gradients may disappear from returning empty trains.
Famous quotes containing the words freight, route and/or strategy:
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