RSSB2724-T1132 Development of Supplementary Freight Container Gauges - Supplier Day - 15th August - 13:00 - 15:00

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RSSB is holding a supplier day on Wednesday 15th August from 13:00 to 15:00 at RSSB offices in London. Should your organisation be interested in attending please email the following email address by COP Tuesday 14th August: Shareditt@rssb.co.uk -- This notification is to attend a supplier day on 15 August 2018 and/or provide information through Expression of Interest (EoI). The supplier day will offer more detail on the background to the research proposal and suppliers will be given the opportunity to ask questions to establish a greater understanding of the project and support the direction of the research. The EoI enables interested parties to put forward their capability and also provide any thinking that could support the development of the scope. To feed into the process, EoIs will need to be received by COP 13 Aug 2018. Background A decline in freight traffic and a shift from the traditional market composition necessitates changes in the rail freight industry to maintain competitiveness with other transport modes. W7, W8, W9 (including W9Plus), W10 (including W10A) & W12 are the standard gauges used for container/wagon combinations, however some of these do not align with some common container/wagon combinations used within the industry e.g. international and domestic intermodal. Consequently, many emerging opportunities need to be authorised annually by Network Rail, which is often time-consuming, impacting rail's competitiveness with other modes of transport. As illustrated below, the development of a set of 'supplementary' container gauges could allow more wagon types and container sizes to be carried on existing cleared routes without costly infrastructure work, opening up more opportunities for rail to exploit. The proposed project will assess the technical and economic feasibility of possible options, before developing suitable supplementary container gauges for inclusion in the revised gauging standards (GE/RT8073). In turn, the outputs from this project should allow the freight community to respond to changing market demands, enhancing its competitiveness against other modes of transport.   Scope of work The envisaged scope of work can be summarised as: The evaluation of the appropriateness of the container gauges An evaluation of the possible container gauge options that are feasible to implement and demonstrate a significant financial benefit to the industry will determine the appropriate container gauges to develop. It is expected the work will include, but is not limited to: 1. An economic assessment of the current and potential demand from high-growth areas (e.g. short-sea and domestic swap body market). The assessment of each supplementary gauge should estimate costs, benefits, and give a consideration of estimated implementation timeframes. 2. A technical feasibility study, including a. A comparison between the proposed supplementary container gauge(s) and existing gauge(s).