Great British Railways (GBR) have received a target from the government to increase rail freight by at least 40% by 2040.
The Department for Transport announced the target on Tuesday 8 September, the same day that the Railways Bill establishing GBR entered its committee stage in the House of Lords.
Rail freight currently carries goods worth around £34 billion annually. Achieving the 2040 target could add around £15 billion to the value of goods transported by rail each year.
The programme has also been linked to road congestion and emissions, with estimations that achieving the new target could avoid up to one million tonnes of CO2 emissions annually compared with moving the same freight by road.
The government expects growth to come from both traditional bulk flows and intermodal and consumer goods traffic, with Network Rail estimating that meeting the target could increase the amount of construction materials transported by rail by 45%, while volumes of goods including cars, wine, white goods and medicines could rise by around 66%.
According to figures cited by the Department for Transport, a single freight train can transport enough material to build around 30 homes.
Freight will also have representation at GBR board level, with the government saying that this should bring the requirements of freight operators and their customers into infrastructure and capacity decisions. One of the responsibilities for GBR will be to work with freight operators on finding additional network capacity. This will be especially important if the government expects substantial growth on a mixed-traffic railway where freight competes for paths with passenger services.
Transport Secretary, Heidi Alexander, said that GBR has a clear mission to help grow the economy by moving more of the goods British businesses rely on, and Network Rail Chief Executive, Jeremy Westlake, highlighted the role of freight in supplying supermarkets and construction projects.
The 40% increase by 2040 is the first defined milestone towards the government's longer-term target of at least 75% rail freight growth by 2050.
CILT(UK) warmly welcomes the government's interim freight growth target, with Julian Worth, Chair of CILT(UK)'s Rail Freight Forum, saying:
"The previously announced 75% growth target by 2025 was welcome but was too remote to have much impact on current policy decisions. Whilst 2040 also seems a long way off, given the lead times for infrastructure enhancements and other investments, it is much closer than it at first seems. Network Rail's Control Period 7 (CP7) ends in 2029 and leads into Great British Railways Financial Period 1 (FP1), which runs until 2034, by which time 2040 will be just 'around the corner'.
"We are equally clear, however, that given the lead time for infrastructure enhancements, it is imperative that planning for such enhancements takes place in the remaining years of the 2020s, and money is committed to building the additional infrastructure - both track and electrification - in the 2030s".
"After a good year for rail freight in 2024/5, 2025/6 was more challenging, as the construction industry had one of its worst years on record. Fortunately, 2026/7 is shaping up to be significantly better, not least due to an encouraging recovery in construction material volumes. Consumer goods in intermodal containers - the biggest single sector, with c.45% of all freight - is also showing strong growth. In these and other sectors it is very clear that customers want to make more use of rail. This is partly for sustainability reasons but mostly because rail is cost effective and helps their supply chains to operate more efficiently."