Transport Information Group

Everybody knows summer is a “slow” period. Thus we have not been writing a lot in the last couple weeks on Transport Expertise, but we did quite a bit of thinking to improve the services we provide, and to choose what we will write about in the future.

After six month of successful activity, we needed to figure out where to go and why. Also, some organizational questions have been raised, and we needed time to work on certain things like “How to market our work and the website?”, “How to promote the documents we produce?”, “What do the readers want to read about?”, etc.

To answer the last questions, we analyzed the site statistics and decided that we will mainly concentrate on five particular topics that have been interesting most of Transport Expertise visitors, since the website’s opening:

• High Speed Rail;
• Public Transport: infrastructure, rolling stock, operation;
• PPP / Toll Roads / Infrastructures investments;
• Green Logistics / Green Supply Chain; and
• Freight Rail and Waterways.

Also, in order to better integrate all the services we provide, we chose that we will publish directly the Transport Information Group Newsletter from a “transport-expertise.org” email address. The Google Group that we have been using until now will be abandoned. Working on the new tools will however take time, and we hope the new delivery system to be ready by September 2008. We will thus be able to send other materials such as new study released to our subscribers.

Activity will resume at full rhythm in the next couple days; our goal now is to publish two daily articles, one in French at 2:00 PM Paris time (6:00 AM EST), and one in English published at 12:00 PM EST/9:00 AM PST.

We are still working on two studies that will be released soon (delayed because of the previous reasons):

• French Offer in Urban Mobility;
• High Speed Rail in France.

We hope to see you on Transport Expertise in the next couple weeks/months. We thank you for your support, and wait for your feedback and comments.

Matthieu Desiderio, Transport Expertise Editor

Paris launch a waterways transit service

Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoë and Jean-Paul Huchon, President of Paris-Ile de France regional Government innaugurated the new waterways transit service Voguéo on Saturday, June 28, 2008.

Operated by RATP, this new service will link Maisons-Alfort in the Val-de-Marne Département to Austerlitz train station inside Paris city (for more details, please see the map attached).

Voguéo Route

Source: MétroPole, RATP. (more…)

Emma Maersk ships are presently the biggest containerships in the world, carrying up to 13,000 TEUs (Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit)… Not for long! The South Korean Group STX Shipbuilding is working on the design of a 22,000 TEUs cargo… The company, which recently took over 39.2% of Aker Yards capital (European shipbuilder), also announced it will increase the production capacity of its South Korean construction plants (Busan and Jinhae) by 20%, from 50 to 60 ships delivered per year.

This new huge containership will be 450 metres long, 50 metres wide, and might, according to STX Shipbuilding, save as much as 40% of fuel per TEU transported. However the South Korean shipbuilder does not have a client yet for this new kind of boat.

Double the size: is this the way to save money?

These containerships will be almost twice the size of the biggest cargos that are delivered nowadays… I would like to raise one question: is this really the best way to reduce costs, and gas consuption? It is clear that massifying more and more transport flows allows to reduce the “per-TEU” cost but bigger ships (and 22,000 TEUs are “quite bigger”) also need bigger infrastructures: first of all, neither every port authority will be able to welcome such containerships, nor they will be able to invest in infrastructure improvements… It might be necessary to look somewhere elso for costs and fuel expenses reductions. (more…)

An announcement from the St. Lawrence Seaway Corporation

The Canadian and U.S. Seaway Corporations are inviting the media to Montreal, Quebec, on Monday, May 5, 2008, to showcase the ballast water inspection process currently in place for the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Seaway System. The Seaway Corporations will be joined by other U.S. and Canadian regulatory agencies, including Transport Canada and the United States Coast Guard, that maintain the strict enforcement regime aimed at protecting the Great Lakes from invasive species.

In addition to a brief press conference held at St. Lambert Lock, the point of entry to the St. Lawrence Seaway, the Seaway Corporations will provide media representatives the opportunity to board an international vessel, the M/V FEDERAL KIVALINA, to examine first hand a ballast water inspection being performed by marine inspectors. Reporters will be permitted to photograph/document the inspection process and tour other areas of the ship.

• What: St. Lawrence Seaway Ballast Water Inspection Media Day
  
• When: Monday, May 5, 2008 2:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.
  
• Where: St. Lambert Lock, Montreal, Quebec (151, de l’Ecluse Street)

References

• Contact in the USA: Tim Downey, SLSDC, +1 (202) 366-0110
• St. Lawrence Seaway Hosts Ballast Water Inspection Media Day in Montreal
• Great Lakes Seaway System Ballast Water Inspection Program

Here are the last U.S. Government Accountability Office (U.S. GAO) reports about transportation, published in March 2008.

• Coast Guard: Observations on the Fiscal Year 2009 Budget, Recent Performance, and Related Challenges. GAO-08-494T, March 6, 2008 (36 pages).
  http://www.gao.gov/docdblite/details.php?rptno=GAO-08-494T
• Surface Transportation: Restructured Federal Approach Needed for More Focused, Performance-Based, and Sustainable Programs. GAO-08-400, March 6, 2008 (85 pages).
  http://www.gao.gov/docdblite/details.php?rptno=GAO-08-400
• Traffic Safety: Grants Generally Address Key Safety Issues, Despite State Eligibility and Management Difficulties. GAO-08-398, March 14, 2008 (55 pages).
  http://www.gao.gov/docdblite/details.php?rptno=GAO-08-398

SNCF board of administrators, the French public rail operator, met Friday, April 4, to complete the acquisition of Geodis Group, a transport and logistics company. SNCF already owned 43% of the shares and made an offer at €135 per share to buy the 57% left, for a total cost of €450 million. However, the share’s price raised 30% on Monday, April 7, to more than €132. SNCF will probably have to make a higher offer.

A national champion for freight and logistics

According to the letter of engagement entrusted to Guillaume Pépy by President Sarkozy, less than 40 days ago, SNCF new President will build a strong national freight and logistics company. The newly formed freight division of SNCF will have a turnover worth €8.5 billion, even more than the passengers’ division which topped €7 billion in 2007. Pierre Blayau, current Geodis President, and already member of SNCF board, is expected to manage the new cargo and logistics branch. He will have to develop a range of combined services (rail, road, logistics and transport brokering) to get the actual freight division back to benefits (Fret SNCF lost more than €200 million in 2007). However, both companies will not merge totally because of the status of the 23,500 Geodis’ employees, completely different from the social status of French railwaymen.

With this acquisition, the SNCF freight division will go international, with TNT Freight Management (Wilson Logistics) bought out by Geodis in 2007. SNCF however remains far behind from its major European competitors, including the German national railway Deutsche Bahn, which generated a turnover of more than €16 billion euros with solely its freight and logistics branch. We can therefore expect additional acquisitions on the part of the SNCF. (more…)