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Campaign for Better Transport has long urged the Government to look at transport infrastructure holistically across the modes, on the basis that building more road capacity will merely stimulate more road traffic and therefore not solve road congestion.
We were pleased to manage Department for Transport-sponsored research which examines the economic benefits of using the railways to solve road congestion. Its results clearly illustrate the advantages of integrated cross-modal Government transport planning, instead of examining the modes separately. In essence, it highlights the socio-economic benefits of upgrading the rail network, as opposed to adding extra lanes to trunk roads on key strategic transport corridors with a parallel rail route.
So we are pleased with the official response from DfT, which said: “We agree with the Campaign for Better Transport that rail freight offers real benefits for the environment and helps keep bulky loads off of the road network, helping to ease congestion for other motorists. We look forward to using these findings to help inform our coming road and rail strategies, and are committed to working with the rail freight industry to support growth of the sector.”
Now we need these words to be translated into affordable rail freight access charges, in the review and funding for key capacity upgrades to the Strategic Rail Freight Network in the next Network Rail Control Period between 2019-24.
The research, carried out for Campaign for Better Transport by consultant MTRU, found that upgrading existing rail lines that run parallel to the motorway routes and are currently almost full would allow large numbers of lorry loads to be transferred to rail, thus reducing road congestion and improving productivity.
While this study considers four corridors separately, the creation of capacity in several corridors at once, plus a network of Strategic Rail Freight Interchanges (SRFIs) that are coming on stream, would also create additional opportunities to transfer traffic - particularly from the ports. The fact that the existing Strategic Rail Freight Interchange at Daventry removes 65 million to 70 million HGV miles a year, most of which would otherwise be on trunk roads, shows SRFIs’ potential to expand rail freight demand.
This research has the power to move the DfT transport planning debate forward. Thus we are urging the Government to use the findings of this research to feed into its future road (RIS2) and rail (HLOS) investment strategies that are now in preparation, and in particular to support continued investment in the Strategic Rail Freight Network. It shows that on certain strategic transport corridors it is possible to improve road conditions without needing to add more road capacity.
The DfT gave a target figure of removing 2,000 HGVs per day from each of the chosen freight corridors, which depending on the different levels of road congestion could equate to removing up to 8,000 cars per day.
The research therefore examined the potential of increasing rail freight capacity along four heavily congested freight routes: the A14 between Felixstowe and the Midlands; the A34 from Southampton to the Midlands; and the M6 and M62 motorways. The report analysed both the HGV and rail traffic on the transport corridors. The first three corridors meet the DfT criteria, with the M62 the only one that needs more research about cargo types data because of the shorter distances involved.
There is suppressed demand for rail freight services because of the lack of capacity on the rail network. Thus there is a level of current freight demand which could be transferred very quickly if capacity were to become available, meaning that the reduction of HGV flows could have a significant impact on road congestion.
However, even allowing for existing funded CP5 plans, moving 2,000 lorries a day to rail freight represents a doubling of current rail traffic from the examined ports, and this cannot be achieved without substantial additional investment in track and terminals. Smart paths and train lengthening, which have been taken into consideration, increases capacity.
HGV DATA
Three different methods were used for analysing the volumes of HGVs, to help validate the results which underpin the report.
- DfT count data (Annual Average Daily flows) was used at eight sites along the A34, at 12 sites along the A14, and at three sites on both the M6 and M62 - this shows year by year results, and type of and size of vehicle.
- Matrix data from a validated GB Freight model (GBFM) gave information on a combination of origins and destinations, likely routeing, and trip lengths. This uses known parameters such as journey length and concentration of trip ends (including national roadside data), and was important for the M6 and M62 analysis where origins and destinations are less clear than for the port traffic considered.
- Continuing Survey of Road Goods Transport (CSRGT) statistics showed trip lengths by size of HGVs and type of cargo nationally.
‘Big data’, such as mobile phone tracking, is not yet reliable for the HGV flows in question.
The national statistics showed that the largest HGVs (five-plus axles) make far more longer-distance trips than the smaller ones (see graph, page 41). This is not surprising, but the extent of the polarisation is noteworthy - a quarter of all their trips are over 300km (187 miles) and a half over 200km. Some of this long-haul traffic should be captive to rail if the rail network allows it.
In fact, these large HGVs (five- and six-axle artics) accounted for more than 50% of HGVs, which average 11% of all traffic on the sections of the network studied, whereas the average national distance travelled for large HGVs is 127km and the average for all HGVs is 85km.
The count data showed that the two A roads have up to 6,500 of the largest HGVs (five- and six-axle articulated lorries) on the corridors each day, between 10% and 17% of all traffic. The M6 has over 13,500 of the largest HGVs a day and the M62 has over 11,000, which represent 10%-12% of all traffic on the two motorway sections.
The corridor analysis shows that these national average figures must be used in combination with detailed corridor analysis, because on certain routes applying national statistics can be misleading.
The Government’s own 2014 policy statement on national networks claimed, by looking at the national figures only, that even doubling rail freight would only reduce road freight by 7%. However, the shift to rail of around 2,000 large HGVs a day on both the A14 and A34 corridors could reduce all sizes of HGV traffic by up to 17%.
