Inland port of Strasbourg to invest 70 million euros in new rail freight terminal

France’s second biggest inland port of Strasbourg, in eastern France, has unveiled a 70 million-euro project to create a new rail freight terminal with the aim of doubling train-borne traffic over the next decade from one to two million tonnes.

It is part of a 200 million euro investment plan over 10 years, of which close to 25 million euros is earmarked for the development of infrastructure at the port’s tri-modal terminal at Lauterbourg. Five million euros will be spent on the river terminal.

A “first phase of operation” of the new rail freight terminal is expected in 2026-2027, before a “gradual ramp-up,” said the port authority’s (PAS) managing director, Claire Merlin, at a press conference earlier this week.

Putting a ‘figure’ on truck traffic

The project is in line with PAS’ objective of “contributing to the ecological transition” and becoming “a tool for the re-industrialisation and decarbonisation” of the economy, she explained.

PAS is committed to offering shippers more opportunities to take advantage of low-impact modes of transport, such as rail and river, by facilitating their use and optimising their efficiency. “We have difficulty estimating the truck traffic generated by the port. That’s one of our objectives: to put a figure on this mode of transport so that we can better propose alternatives.”

Tackling low water levels and strikes

The new rail freight terminal is also expected to contribute to enhancing the complementarity between rail and river transport at the port. Low-water periods on the Rhine in 2018 and 2022 had a negative impact on barge traffic.

In 2023, the Port of Strasbourg handled 6.2 million tonnes of river-borne freight – mainly in the form of construction materials and cereals – down 2.5 per cent on the previous year. This compared with just under one million tonnes for rail freight, which fell by almost 20 per cent versus 2022.

PAS attributed the decline to a number of factors, including strikes on the national rail network in the first quarter of last year, a general downturn in consumption and a rise in the cost of energy.

Freight trains keep coming

However, PAS also pointed out that the port had nevertheless maintained rail shuttle frequencies at a high level, with 17 services per week to Antwerp, Rotterdam and Dijon/Gevrey-Marseille-Fos.

In February of this year, PAS’ Lauterbourg terminal saw the deployment of the first freight train to the port of Antwerp, with MSC providing the containers, Fret SNCF supplying the traction, and Wascosa supplying the wagons. The service also entails the participation of Bolloré Logistics and ACPMC Strasbourg.

Earlier this year also saw Soprema, a French company specialising in waterproofing, roofing, soundproofing and thermal insulation, invest 150,000 euros in re-activating a domestic rail freight service between Strasbourg and Rouen.