French quarry group Carrières de l’Ouest inaugurates new terminal near Paris

Cinérites Transport & Logistique (CTL), freight forwarding arm of French quarry operator, Carrières de l’Ouest, has officially inaugurated a multi-modal freight terminal at the inland port of Bonneuil, on the river Marne, in the Greater Paris region. The new terminal will facilitate the rail freight transport of Carrières de l’Ouest aggregates.

Contacted by Railfreight.com, the President and CEO, Thomas Dupuy d’Angeac, said that Carrières de l’Ouest had invested 600,000 euros in the Bonneuil terminal. The new facility, which is located on a site owned by Haropa Port, is connected to the railway network and also has wide-gauge river access. Every week, CTL will run five trains between Voutré and Bonneuil, with an annual capacity of 300,000 tonnes of materials, reducing road freight traffic volumes by the equivalent of 9,400 trucks every year.

Voutré Double Fret

Carrières de l’Ouest has also developed a round-trip freight system, Voutré Double Fret, in collaboration with France’s rail network manager, SNCF Réseau and Haropa Port, focusing on the transport by train of aggregates from its quarries in Voutré and Le Mans in western France to construction sites in the Greater Paris region. Return journeys carry excavated materials to be used as landfill. To support the service, Carrières de l’Ouest has developed open-top containers suitable for rail and road transport.

In an interview with Railfreight.com earlier this year, President and CEO, Thomas Dupuy d’Angeac, said the group was looking to set up additional multimodal terminals and had carried out a test at Gennevilliers, on the banks of the Seine, Paris’ largest river port, with terminal operator Paris Terminal, which had been very positive. A weekly service to and from Gennevilliers is planned from 2025. Establishing a terminal at the Port of Nantes-St Nazaire is also under discussion.

Carrières de l’Ouest and Haropa Port

While Voutré Double Fret is proving its worth for Carrières de l’Ouest’s own business, the group is now focused on extending the concept to third parties. Earlier this year, work began on installing infrastructure that would allow the Voutré hub to handle several trains at a time with investment costs estimated at 2 million euros.

Separately, Haropa Port is driving the development of multi-modal services from its river terminals. Last year, it tasked ocean shipping group MSC’s logistics arm Medlog to operate a trimodal – river, rail and road – hub at Bruyères-sur-Oise, around 40 kilometres from Paris, with container traffic identified as a key segment for growth.