Hutchison’s Felixstowe is one of the busiest ports in Europe – but not just for shipping. Felixstowe is Britain’s busiest rail freight terminal too. When it comes to container movements, trains are not confined to a consolidated marshalling yard in the industrial hinterland. They’re supporting what Britain’s ports do best – trading with the world.
In Suffolk, on the east coast of England, Felixstowe is dealing with its dual role as far and away the busiest port in Britain, but it’s also far and away Britain’s busiest rail freight terminal. However, the real story is that Felixstowe is far from alone, and at least one challenger is coming up on the rails.
Britain’s rail freight champion is constrained
Felixstowe is often quoted among the British rail industry as the busiest terminal in the UK. It’s hardly surprising, given the size of the port operation and the importance of intermodal traffic to the modern rail freight sector. Three dedicated rail terminals are serviced by a complicated rail infrastructure that moves around 35 trains a day in and out of the port.
However, if anything constrains rail movements at Felixstowe, it’s where the traffic goes after leaving the port estate. The single-track branch line that serves the port rail yards is a brake on movements. More challenging, though, is the congested rail layout at nearby Ely, where port traffic competes for paths with mixed traffic from four other directions. Reconfiguring the layout (the long-overdue and already named Ely Area Capacity Enhancement programme) is a constant source of debate in the UK.
The rising contender
If Felixstowe is to lose its crown, which isn’t very likely, it would probably be taken by an unconstrained site, purpose-built for the modern trading volume. That might just describe rival DP World’s London Gateway, a new-build container port in Essex, that’s rapidly emerging as a formidable challenger in the UK’s rail freight sector. Opened in 2013, just 70 miles (112km) south of Felixstowe, the port has been designed with scalability in mind.
Currently, it dispatches around 22 intermodal trains daily, connecting to major freight terminals across Great Britain, including Hams Hall, Trafford Park, Liverpool, Glasgow, Cardiff, and Daventry. Once daily, a shuttle operates, almost like an internal service, connecting London Gateway with DP World’s other UK facility, at Southampton. That, though, only scratches the surface. The port’s rail terminal is one of the largest in the UK, capable of accommodating six trains simultaneously. Plans are underway to develop a second rail terminal on site, which will radically increase handling capacity.
Sustainable transport options
“In rail, London Gateway is currently [handling] 22 trains a day with some additional trains starting,” said Andy Bowen, Chief Operating Officer, UK Ports & Terminals for DP World. “Southampton, we’re feeding across the country, around 20 as well. Both ports are doing around 30 per cent rail modal share at the moment. We have an aspiration to continue to put more cargo on the rail.”
That aspiration is shared at Felixstowe. Just over a year ago, Robert Ashton, Operations Director at the Port of Felixstowe, answered RailFreight.com and emphasised the significance of expanding rail transportation options. “Increasing the proportion of traffic moving by rail is an important part of our strategy to offer the widest possible range of sustainable transport options through the Port of Felixstowe”, he said.
The Evolution of Rail Freight in the UK
Historically, rail freight has played a crucial role in serving UK ports, evolving from traditional bulk cargo transport to the modern containerised intermodal services we see today. The great container terminals – like Felixstowe, London Gateway and Southampton, but also Liverpool, Tilbury, and Hull. They all have an interest in rail. Similarly, ports handling traditional bulk cargo, like Immingham-Humber (Britain’s busiest port by weight of cargo moved), Newcastle-Tyne and Liverpool again, rely heavily on rail to transport bulk commodities such as biomass and aggregates.
Intermodal rail freight now accounts for about half of all rail freight traffic in Britain, underscoring its significance in the national logistics network. It is the commodity that continues to grow. While Felixstowe remains the leader, London Gateway’s rapid expansion indicates a shift in the dynamics of UK intermodal rail freight. With its modern infrastructure and strategic location, London Gateway is on track to catch its closest rival. Nevertheless, both will continue to be pivotal, at least in terms of the UK’s intermodal rail traffic.