The EU’s investing heavily in rail infrastructure as part of their overall infrastructure development strategy.
The European Commission (EC) has selected 134 transport projects to receive a record sum of over €7 billion (US$7.63 billion) in EU grants from the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF), the EU’s instrument for strategic investment in infrastructure. This represents the largest call under the current CEF Transport program.
It said the funding will support projects that deliver on the EU’s climate objectives, improving and modernizing the EU network of railways, inland waterways and maritime routes along the Trans European Transport (TEN-T) Network.
Rail projects will receive the lion’s share (80%) of the €7 billion (US$7.63 billion), a reflection of the Commission’s fixed objective, set out in its 2020 Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy, to double rail freight traffic by 2050.
The EU funding package has allocated additional subsidies of €700 million (US$763.01 million) towards the development of a cross-border, Alpine rail link between France and Italy – the Turin-Lyon tunnel – to enhance rail capacity for passenger and freight traffic.
The mega undertaking entails the construction of two 57.5-km-long tubes for the Mont Cenis base tunnel and 48 km of safety and maintenance tunnels.
The project is supported by public authorities and economic players in France and Italy, who view it as a significant opportunity to develop rail freight and take many trucks plying trans-Alpine routes off the roads.
Rail Impacts
However, it does have detractors in both France and Italy who point to the rail link’s impact on the natural environment while its projected investment costs are perceived as exorbitant and subject to constant upward revision.
TELT (Tunnel Euralpin Lyon Turin), the Franco-Italian public company set up in 2015 to manage the project, recently announced that the base tunnel will cost €2.5 billion (US$2.73 billion) more than initially planned, the budget rising to €11.1 billion (US$12.1 billion). This represents a rise of almost 30% on previous estimates and is attributed to a number of factors; the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine have led to supply difficulties and higher costs for certain raw materials, notably steel and energy.
These additional costs are expected to be borne by the French and Italian governments, each a 50% shareholder, but also by the EU which can finance up to half of TELT’s projects.
What’s more, the base tunnel, which was due to be operational in 2032, will now only be delivered at the end of 2033. 37.3 km have already been excavated, including 13.7 km of the base tunnel.
Global investment in the controversial project was estimated at more than €26 billion (US$28.34 billion) back in 2012 by the French Audit Office and no overall figure has been provided since.
Construction work is set to ramp up in the coming months with the first of seven new tunnel boring machines scheduled for assembly in August. When each of these boring machines are operational, work is expected to advance at a rate of three kilometres per month.
EU investment is also earmarked for other major rail projects to improve cross-border rail connections along the TEN-T’s core network such as in the Baltic member states (Rail Baltica), and between Denmark and Germany (the Fehmarnbelt Tunnel).
The €7 billion (US$7.63 billion) subsidy package will also benefit around 20 maritime ports in Ireland, Spain, Finland, the Netherlands, Germany, Malta, Lithuania, Cyprus, Croatia, Greece, and Poland who will receive support for infrastructure upgrades, some of which will enable them to supply shore-side electricity to ships, or transport renewable energy.
Port-rail synergies are also high on the freight transport agenda of the EU and member states, France being a prime example.
Addressing a French Senate committee earlier this summer, Matthieu Chabanel, the head of the country’s rail network manager, SNCF Réseau, highlighted the need for ports and railways in France to increase their cooperative efforts to increase the share of rail freight.
He took the example of the Port of Calais, a major gateway for ro/ro traffic between Europe and the UK, where a major project is attracting public investment totaling €83 million euros (US$90.47 million).
The project is divided into two phases: the first entails the modernization of the existing rail infrastructure, while the second focuses on the creation of a new line in the port area. This will enable the development of combined rail-road freight transport and the possibility to triple rail freight traffic from three to four trains daily today to up to 15 round-trip trains daily by 2040.
New Terminals
SNCF Réseau is also working with the Port of Marseille on a project attracting public investment of almost €60 million (US$65.40 million) and encompassing urban development and the creation of new combined freight terminals.
In a separate development, intermodal terminal operator, Open Modal Group, has announced the opening of a state-of-the-art hub for swap bodies and containers in Miramas, on the outskirts of Marseille. The terminal has attracted public and private investment estimated at almost €40 million (US$43.60 million).
The new terminal welcomed its first train late-April, arriving from Nancy, in eastern France, followed by Lille-Avignon-Miramas and (Paris) Bonneuil-Miramas services.
When fully-operational this September it will be able to handle four 850-metre-long trains simultaneously. The ‘combi’ hub’s equipment will also comprise two remote-controlled electric gantry cranes, two electric reach stackers, an electric road-rail shunter, and a storage area of 10,000 sqm. The terminal will have the capacity to handle 68,000 UTIs (intermodal transport unit) annually.
Meanwhile, SNCF Réseau is working on the creation of inland rail-road transport hubs serving France’s biggest container port, Le Havre. One is under development near Orléans, in central France.
Another example of port-rail interface comes from Normandy where Brittany Ferries is setting up a ‘rolling rail highway’ for the transfer of UK-Ireland-France-Spain road-borne freight out of the Port of Cherbourg and the Basque Country on the French-Spanish border – a distance of around 1,000 kms. The first trains are earmarked to run from end-March next year.
