Mov in g Matters
➲ Rail transportation of Ford’s Transit
van in North America has demanded
a flexible approach from the railroad
operators
Rail Flexibility
There are several interesting points to this story. Firstly, that three
separate (privately-owned) railway companies were involved,
secondly, the co-ordinated nature of the new arrangement to
execute a defined transportation task, and lastly, that Ford was
able to make an economic decision to use different modes inside
and outside of the 500 mile radius (about the same distance
as Johannesburg-Durban). This is particularly instructive to the
South African situation where the government seems hell-bent
on moving freight off the roads and on to rail. It proves that,
in a situation of free choice, business efficiency dictates that
the most efficient mode will be used for the task, rather than
following some dictate that is driven by an obscure ideological
agenda.
This column often delves into the debate on the relative merits
of road and rail transportation. As we have frequently stated,
we are in favour of the evolution of a comprehensive intermodal
system for South Africa, where economics determines the most
appropriate mode, or combination of modes, for any defined
transportation task. However, it has been our concern that the
present government’s policy direction seems to be reliant on the
wholesale, and extremely expensive, injection of new hardware
into the system, rather than through the recognition that
optimised service delivery is the most important factor that will
eventually win the day.
While rail is undeniably cost-effective for moving bulk
commodities, such as mineral substances, from mines to
harbours, or for transporting containers from ports to distant
terminals, it is those transport tasks that require the use of road
| logistics in action
transport at either the beginning, or end of the linehaul,
that will prove most challenging to the rail mode. Once the
load is put on to a truck, it is very tempting to leave it there
until it reaches its final destination. Intermodal operations
demand a high level of co-operation and co-ordination
between the various operators if loads are to be delivered
in an acceptable and predictable timescale, and for this
reason, we have long advocated the setting up of joint
ventures between Transnet and private sector operators to
secure the appropriate levels of co-ordination and control.
We are pleased to note that this trend seems to be finally
taking root.
We also recently read a report that Transnet’s National
Command Centre, located in Parktown, Johannesburg,
exercises proactive real-time train control monitoring
and deviation management, and is responsible for train
service design, service planning, interface, train movement
management, emergency response, and business
continuity management “based on customer needs”.
This sounds highly impressive, and should provide the
channel through which individual shippers can be kept
fully appraised of the progress of their consignments.
There has been a long-held perception that railways see
themselves as “train operators”, rather than logistics
providers. The recent experience, where single logistics
companies have been able to offer a total service that
includes warehousing, transportation, inventory control
and even customer invoicing, gives a clear indication of
the way forward.
If railways in South Africa are to regain
anything like the position of
dominance they occupied up till
the 1980’s, a similar model will
need to be fully understood,
and applied.
85
AUGUST 2014
moving matters
W
e recently read of a new
arrangement that has
been developed by the
Ford Motor Company in North
America with Canadian National,
Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern
railways for the shipment of Ford’s
new Transit panel vans to dealers
across the continent. A challenge
arose from the fact that the van
comes with a choice of three roof
heights, and that Ford uses rail
delivery for dealers located outside
a 500-mile radius from its Kansas
City assembly plant. The highest
roof version of the Transit did not fit
into the standard double-deck railcars used for vehicle deliveries,
so a flexible design was evolved for the railcars where the top
deck ramp could be raised to accommodate up to seven highroofed Transits on the lower level, while smaller cars could still
be accommodated in the space between the upper ramp and
the roof of the enclosed railcar. Overall height of the rail vehicles
is fixed by the requirement to traverse tunnels and overhead
bridges.