Combined road-rail freight transport operator Be Modal could launch a service for maritime containers between Rennes, in Brittany and France’s biggest box port, Le Havre, next year.
The project was unveiled at a recent webinar organised by Brittany Supply Chain, an association of regional shippers and logistics companies.
A subsidiary of Brittany-based Lahaye Global Logistics, Be Modal was set up as recently as April 2023. It currently operates two scheduled routes, one connecting Rennes with Dourges, a freight hub in northern France and the other between Rennes and Nancy in the country’s east.
At port request
Continuing its strong growth curve, from 7 April 2025, the company will launch a new service between Rennes and Lyon-Vénissieux. Be Modal expects to operate just short of 750 trains this year.
Speaking at the webinar, Bastien Thirion, Lahaye’s director of rail freight, said that at the request of HAROPA Port, Be Modal has drawn up plans to establish a rail link between Rennes and the Port of Le Havre’s intermodal road-rail terminal. The route chosen would pass through the Greater Paris region, which offers more reliable rail infrastructure and better operating conditions than the more direct path via Normandy, he explained.
15,000 boxes a year
“We have opted for a schedule of two weekly round trips to not duplicate resources. In other words, to be able to manage this solution with a single train making round trips and a single wagon; thus allowing us to amortise our fixed costs as much as possible by having locomotives and wagons running practically all week.”
“Be Modal favours the provision of train sets of 20 80-foot intermodal wagons, specifically adapted to maritime containers. This type of equipment optimises the loading of 20-, 30- and 40-foot containers. A train set could hold up to 80 TEU,” Thirion noted. The company estimates that it could transport up to 15,000 boxes a year on the route (import and export), with trains also accommodating refrigerated containers.
Be Modal will shortly be testing out a wagon with an electricity-generating solution integrated into the chassis, thereby avoiding using diesel fuel. A survey will sound out interest among shippers in a Rennes-Le Havre combi service, and if this reveals that sufficient demand exists to justify its launch, the first trains could operate on the route in 2026, Thirion added.
French ports want multimodality with rail
Also speaking at the webinar was François-Xavier Marie, director of Development at HAROPA Port, the umbrella agency running the ports of Le Havre, Rouen and Paris, who underlined that the development of train-borne freight services was a key element in the grouping’s multi-modal transport strategy.
HAROPA Port’s rail freight services currently consist of 100 round trips by train weekly to 21 domestic and international destinations, including Bordeaux, Lyon, Marseille, Fos-sur-Mer, Miramas, Avignon, Nova (Italy) and Chavornay (Switzerland), operated by Naviland Cargo, Ferrovergne, Delta Rail and T3M.
Marie pointed to the short-term objectives of HAROPA Port’s multimodal transport strategy. In 2023, the modal split for container traffic transported to and from its ports showed road having an 82 per cent share of the whole, followed by rail (10 per cent) and river (5 per cent). This year the target is for road’s share to fall to 77 per cent, with rail and river rising to 12 per cent and 8 per cent, respectively.
As for the modal split for bulk traffic transported to and from Le Havre in 2023, road’s share was 65 per cent, followed by rail (25 per cent) and river (10 per cent). This year, the objective is to reduce the road to 60 per cent, with rail and river increasing to 26 per cent and 14 per cent, respectively.