Abellio - key figures
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On internet, many people talk about
‘intermodal train’, but without to distingue what's is exactly loaded. Is it a
container, or a semi-trailer? We can distingue four different intermodal
systems by their economy and by their technology.
Container
The containers are clearly a worldwide
marine economy. Their origine comes from the military logistic whose the method
has been applied to the marine economy and on the harbours. This allows today
to load and unload several thousand tonnes to and from a vessel within a few
hours. The dimensions were approved by an economic and technical committee of
UNO in years 60's and they are today the ISO standard dimensions applied on the
15 millions containers which currently in operation worldwide. On outside the
harbour terminal, the containers can be loaded on trains, barges or
semi-trailers, which makes the concept of container so 'intermodal'. In Europe,
the dimensions are however slightly shorter than a semi-trailer, and this lead
the fact that the 'continental transport' is entirely worked by motor carriers
and semi-trailers, more large. Storage in container yards can be grounded where
containers are stored by stacking them upon one another and are moved by a
crane fitted with a spreader which lifts the container by gripping from the
roof, as shown the picture below.
Video : loading at the shipping terminal in Hambourg
Video : container moved by reach stacker
Video : on board of a reach stacker
Video : container moved by reach stacker
Video : on board of a reach stacker
Semi-trailers
The semi-trailers, or trucking, is a
technology from the road economy, the most used mode for continental freight
transport. It is the most serious rival to railways. Since years 50's, a few
pioneers of road carriers got the idea to load semi-trailers on trains, by a
vertical loading. For many years, the corner hight was the major stumbling
block of the intermodal transport. Because of the presence of the wheels,
semi-trailers can only be loaded on a special wagon with a recessed pocket to
accept the road wheels of the semi-trailer. Today, many ultra low-loader wagons
make it possible to transport trucks with a height of 4 meters on some railway
lines, such as the Gotthard route. Contrary to the containers, semi-trailers
can't not be stacked. Indeed, many semi-trailers are made up with curtains which
make them a body no rigid. That's requires special handling equipment with four
grapple-arm to lift the semi-trailer from four points located around the floor
frame, as shown below.
Video of a loading
Swap-bodies
That's looks like to semi-trailers, but
without their wheels and floor frame. It's also not a container, what we
have said above. The benefit is to avoid the dead weight of the floor frame and
the wheels, and to load on any kind of wagons, without low-floor. Its
disadvantage is clearly on road hand side : contrary to semi-trailers, there
are two chassis, one for the truck, a second for the swap body. The loading is
similar to a semi-trailer, with four grapple-arm to lift the swap body from
four points located around the floor frame, as shown below.
Video : unloading of a swap body by reach stacker
Rolling highway
Rolling highways, in their German’s version,
are a rail transport of full-road vehicles and tractors with driver, with the
use of low-floor wagons. It's the railway version of the ferry services across
the sea. It's an accompanied transport because the truck driver accompanies his
road train in a couchette car or a classical coach car. To reach the 4 meter
corner hight, the wagon have low-floor along their full length, that’s require
wheels of wagon with a little radius, which have more wear. There are no cranes
because the loading is made by truck drivers themselves. That's requires that
the trucks follow each other for embark by an access ramp at the beginning of
the train, similar to embark on a ferry. Rolling highways are not really
competitive due to high costs of the eight axles wagons, except the Eurotunnel
shuttle.
Video : boarding on a german's "ROLA"
Video : ROLA in Switzerland
The
future is horizontal…
In the past few years, new ideas have been
launched on the intermodal industry. Firstly with the french company Lohr
Industry, which launched it's 'Modalohr' concept in 2003. The system can be
compared with the similar rolling highway concept described above, but it uses
specialized railroad wagons for carrying road trailers and road tractors, by
using of the classical bogies which reduce maintenance of wheels. Another new
idea is the Megaswing concept developed by the Swedish firm Kockums Industrier.
There use also the classical bogies but provides two additional advantages, by
utilization of the Megaswing wagon as an individual unit, and by the fact that
the wagon can be loaded/unloaded without any crane. This concept can to
interest many factories which don't want to use a specialized intermodal
terminal and which want to be free of timetables and of the management of their
own loading. The last concept is more revolutionary and comes from Germany.
CargoBeamer, that is his name, takes semi-trailers from truck to truck like a
passenger. The system can load and unload a train with 36 semi-trailers in just
15 minutes, by dragging the low floor horizontally from the wagon directly on
the terminal, as shown his video below.
Video of Modalohr
Video of Kockums Industrier (Megaswing)
