Terminals & Private Sidings

Development of a new terminal need not be a permanent, costly or time-consuming project. It may be possible to commence rail services through a terminal with basic facilities.

The starting point for determining the type of terminal and rail service will be the commodity and volumes involved. For example, terminal facilities for a daily flow of 3,000 tonnes of aggregate will differ greatly from those for a 300 tonne flow of palletised food. Beyond this, the duration of the freight flow will also have an impact on the type of terminal facilities involved. A short-term or seasonal flow will be unlikely to justify a major permanent terminal. In some cases, a combination of intermittent freight flows (both import and export) could collectively justify a basic terminal facility.

There are around 1,000 active rail freight terminals connected to the national rail network, as well as a number of major rail-linked distribution parks either in existence or under development. The fastest and cheapest way to gain access to rail freight services will probably be via one of these terminals, either using the existing facilities, or through developing additional facilities on or adjacent to the active terminal.

For information about the planning freight terminal facilities on new or disused sites, please click here.

To locate suitable rail freight terminal sites please view existing connections or strategic freight sites.

In addition, some local authorities may also hold details on active and potential sites for terminals within their locality. For listings, please view potential sites.

Types of terminals

Examples of rail freight terminals include:

Private sidings

Rail terminals are a loading pad, warehouse or factory of despatch or receipt, removing the need for additional road movements that may significantly increase the overall transport cost. Such savings must be balanced against the costs of developing, operating and maintaining a private siding.

Common-user terminal

These may share some of the features of private sidings, but are distinguished by their accessibility to more than one customer. A number of these terminals are available within Great Britain and continental Europe, and include rail-linked warehousing and intermodal transfer facilities. These are typically operated by the freight operating companies or third-party logistics providers.

Use of existing terminals

For a new rail freight service, the quickest means of obtaining terminal facilities is usually to make use of existing railheads. Details of these can be found in our Guide to Freight Connections, or by contacting the Network Rail Senior Route Freight Manager, freight operating companies or terminal operators.

In determining which railhead to employ, minimising distance between railheads and the origin/destination of the freight flow will be important. There is no hard and fast rule as to how close a railhead must be to be viable, as this will be a function of the overall distance and cost of the end-to-end transportation, and the costs of any local collection and delivery work by road. Bulk trainload volumes (e.g. 500-1,000+ tonnes) with a single origin and destination should ideally have railheads within 5-10 miles of the ultimate point of despatch/receipt. Individual intermodal loads (e.g. less than 30 tonnes) may travel up to 100 miles by road to and from a pan-European intermodal terminal, or up to 50 miles for a domestic intermodal terminal.

If suitable existing railheads can be identified, the next step will be to determine if the facilities have sufficient capacity to service both existing traffic and the additional proposed flow, in the following areas:

• Timetable - are there enough paths available for freight trains at suitable times?
• Siding space - can the terminal cope with extra wagons/trains?
• Transfer, handling and storage equipment - can the existing facilities cope with the anticipated type and volume of traffic?
• Road access - where required, can the relevant access roads cope with additional HGV movements?
• Local planning restrictions - is the site free from constraints on operating hours, noise and lighting levels etc?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, additional capacity will be required. This may involve additional development (which may raise local or regional planning issues), and investment. The issues relating to enhancement of an existing terminal are broadly similar to those for developing a new terminal, as set out in Planning new terminals.