Earlier this year, LIST researchers set up the scenario and management of intermodal transport trials, as part of the European Interreg IVB project Weastflows. The highlight of a project that lasted more than five years, its objective was to demonstrate the potential of the existing intermodal connections in the North-West Europe through two real-life scenarios using containerised transport between Bettembourg in Luxembourg and Ballina in Ireland.
As part of the demonstration, two different transport routes were trialed: one mainly using road transport with a crossing to Great Britain, and another one mainly using rail with shortsea shipping around Great Britain.
The Intermodal Route Planner and Track & Trace tagging, two IT tools developed earlier within the Weastflows project, were used to support the operation. These tools make it possible to view existing connections between two locations and to provide accurate goods tracking information.
The trials demonstrate that a solution combining both rail and shortsea shipping makes it possible to minimise the environmental impact by the equivalent of 442 kg CO2, or 60% of emissions of road-only transportation, and is therefore more favorable in an environmental point of view. However, this solution has an inconvenient aspect: the waiting times at the different terminals are longer that those recorded for road-only transport, respectively 40% and 33% longer in total.
In order to save time, in the future the intermodal alternative needs to benefit from an increase in both the frequency of railway connections to maritime ports and direct maritime connections between the continent and Ireland.
An informative film about the various stages of the trials, including interviews with LIST researchers who worked on the project, is now available on LIST’s YouTube channel.
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