Eurotunnel, the company that operates the Channel tunnel, hopes to double the volume of rail freight using the route in as little as three years after making the most sweeping changes to the undersea tunnel’s charging system in 20 years.
Jacques Gounon, Eurotunnel’s executive chairman, on Tuesday announced lower average charges for rail freight companies. Mr Gounon said he hoped that within three to five years Eurotunnel would beat its volumes in 1998, its best year for rail freight, when a little over 3m tonnes were carried.
Volumes in 2006 were only 1.57m tonnes and so far this year are down a further 25 per cent, according to figures released last week.
The changes mark the first time that Eurotunnel has been willing to give up its rights to charge users heavy fees under the contract agreed between Eurotunnel, the then-nationalised British Rail and SNCF, France’s national train operator, in 1987, while the tunnel was still under construction.
“Our goal is to reach 6m tonnes a year in five to seven years,” Mr Gounon said. The typical cost of running a freight train through the tunnel will fall from the £5,300 ($7,540) average so far in 2007 to £3,000.
Charges will be based mainly on whether the train is running at a peak or off-peak time and its speed – slower trains use up more of the tunnel’s capacity.
A complex system of varying charges according to the commodity on the train will be scrapped.
Eurotunnel also hopes to attract new users. At present, all services are run jointly by EWS – a UK-based subsidiary of Germany’s Deutsche Bahn – and the freight division of France’s SNCF.
New operators will be charged a maximum of £400 on top of the toll for hire of the Class 92 electric locomotive needed to run through the tunnel and other extra costs.
Eurotunnel itself plans to start rail freight services from France to UK destinations soon.
EWS increased its fees significantly last year when the UK government stopped paying its tunnel tolls following the expiry of a deal struck when the company bought British Rail’s international freight business at privatisation in 1997.
