Swiss Split is a rail service in Switzerland which distributes containers via conventional shunting yards directly from intermodal terminals to the final recipients’ sidings by rail. Today’s Swiss Split service is quite successful, but it still has several weaknesses that reduce its competitiveness compared to container distribution by truck. Thus, the two main research questions were: Which feasible improvements for container distribution by rail can be determined? In how far do these improvements increase the competitiveness of container distribution by rail compared to container distribution by truck? The research bases on previous analyses regarding the weaknesses of container distribution by rail in Switzerland. For each of the identified weaknesses, suitable improvements were developed. The effects of these improvements were supposed to have an impact on the efficiency and the quality of the services. The improvements were then assessed by applying a cost model for rail freight and truck transportation. For this purpose, today’s Swiss Split was modelled in a base case and the input data for the cost model (e.g., round trips per day for wagons, routing for the transports, train length and train utilisation) were changed according to the estimated effects of the improvements. To finally estimate the impact of the improvements on the SWL production schemes, an agent based simulation for SWL was developed and applied. The analysis of today’s Swiss Split distribution by rail showed weaknesses in the fields of rolling stock, transhipment terminal structures and the production schemes for SWL. Thus, a new container wagon has been developed to serve the sidings. The terminal structure has been improved by a new gateway terminal. The production schemes for SWL have been improved by applying a train-coupling-and-sharing network structure and an improved schedule structure for SWL trains. An agent based simulation software for rail freight has been developed to assess the improvements in the production scheme. At last, the new business model for Swiss Split has led to an integration of transhipment processes and rail distribution. In sum all of these measures have resulted in significant cost reductions for the container distribution by rail. The breakeven distance for Swiss Split compared to truck container distribution has been decreased from 140 to 70 km. Hence, using SWL for final distribution has proofed to be competitive to trucking even for rather short distances. This shows that rail freight can be competitive compared to road transportation if a holistic approach which tackles all weaknesses of the existing services is applied.

/pdf/swiss-split-a-holistic-approach-to-the-distribution-of-2ryvrb74r9.pdf

Swiss Split—a holistic approach to the distribution of containers to private sidings

The article discusses the issues associated with the organization of empty cars by type of rolling stock and by owners, possible points of their assembly; the analysis of the plan for the formation of empty cars is carried out, in order to identify the station for concentrating empty cars by type of rolling stock and their routes to them. The analysis of groups of wagons, which can be organized into exit routes, is carried out. The criteria of the optimization of task set for the promotion of empty cars and the improvement of the quality indicators of operational work for JSC “Russian Railways” (“RR”) are well-grounded.

Organization and Movement of Exit Routes from Empty Cars

Nowadays a significant part of the maritime containers with origin or destination in Switzerland are distributed by rail into private sidings. The containers are transhipped in intermodal terminals from the long-distance shuttle-trains or barges to flat wagons of SBB Cargo. The wagons are distributed within the national single wagonload (SWL) network to the final recipients’ sidings. The SwissSplit nowadays has some weaknesses, which reduce the competitiveness compared to the container distribution by truck: The terminal structure in Switzerland is very dispersed with a multitude of small terminals. The actual business model covers only the rail transport from the terminal to the destination siding, this causes inefficiencies in the overall distribution process. The conventional platform wagons used for the SwissSplit are quite old and have reached the end of their economic lifetime. Within the ViWaS project HaCon, SBB Cargo, Wascosa and ETH Zurich developed several approaches to improve the SwissSplit. In general a new business model covering the entire transport chain from the terminal to the siding and back to the container depot was developed, the SWL production schemes were improved and an optimized terminal network that eases the transfer of the wagons into the SWL network was introduced. A major part of the improvements was the development of a new type of flat wagon to improve the loading and unloading processes in the sidings. The wagon was tested within the SwissSplit-network of SBB Cargo. This paper describes the findings of the development and the feasibility tests of the new SwissSplit-Wagon and the overall feasibility of the improved SwissSplit.

https://cyberleninka.org/article/n/682546.pdf

Improving the Container Distribution by Rail into Swiss Sidings

To achieve the modal shift projected by public transport policies, intermodal rail transport needs to improve its performance in order to become more attractive. Hub-and-spoke (HS) bundling is an option to improve its performance. It potentially increases the attractiveness of intermodal rail freight services, also for flows that are too small to fill a direct train on the required frequency level. HS bundling can be carried out in different ways (types of hubs, trains and operations). Only some of them lead to competitive transport services. This paper argues that – in many situations – the best HS network employs terminal hubs and shuttle trains, and that the hub terminal should be a real hub terminal. A real hub terminal is designed to fulfil its main function, rail-rail transhipment, effectively and efficiently. Despite their apparent advantages HS networks with real hub terminals are penetrating the market at a very slow pace. The paper discusses major barriers for a faster implementation, and advocates a change of perception of rail operators, and also of public transport policies. It is recommended that the development of hub terminals is supported by public vision-making and cooperative or more centralised network design within the sector.

The challenge of appropriate hub terminal and hub-and-spoke network development for seaports and intermodal rail transport in Europe

Grossterminalstudie: Beurteilung der Terminalprojekte Gateway Limmattal und Basel-Nord: Schlussbericht

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Grossterminalstudie: Beurteilung der Terminalprojekte Gateway Limmattal und Basel-Nord: Schlussbericht