Rail freight transport in urban areas faces a number of problems resulting from technical, legal, and organizational causes. This transport can be based on the use of classic railway wagons, logistics platforms, and freight trams. Linking all technical means of transport requires solving issues of organizational compatibility and cargo standardization. The article addresses the area of common conditions for the integration of freight transport in terms of urban logistics organization.
Urban logistics views integrated freight transport as a factor determining the fluidity of goods flow in transit through the city, as well as the fluidity of deliveries to recipients in the city and the collection of products from manufacturers and their export outside the city limits. The fluidity of freight movement in the city faces problems:
– technical
– organizational
– legal
These issues require partial analysis. This allows for the definition of limitations and possibilities for integrated rail transport in the city.
1. Technical conditions
1.1. Track gauge
1.2. Structure gauge
1.3. Axle loads
1.4. Minimum turning radius
1.5. Cargo standardization
1.6. Rolling stock
2. Organizational conditions
2.1. Transshipment technique
2.2. Transshipment points, logistics centers
2.3. Distribution network
2.4. Management
3. Legal conditions
3.1. Rolling stock and construction standards
3.2. Transport law
1. Technical conditions
Current assumptions for logistics platforms allow for the entry of railway technology onto tram tracks. This issue faces a number of limitations resulting from the fact of existing railway and tram infrastructure. One of them is the track gauge.
1.1. Track gauge
Standard gauge railway uses tracks with a width of 1435 mm. It is the most popular track standard in the world. It has been adopted in the article as a reference point.
Tram tracks have different track widths. For example, for Germany and Poland, they are most often 1000 and 1435 mm (1450 mm in Dresden).
Such a state makes it impossible for railway rolling stock to enter tram tracks. To enable freight wagons to enter tram tracks other than 1435 mm, solutions are possible in the form of:
a) systems for changing the wheel gauge in railway bogies, e.g., SUW-2000 from Poznań, fig. 1., but a significant obstacle to their use is that they are designed for entry onto broad-gauge tracks (1524 mm) and their price. This requires the use of gradual track gauge change points.
b) the use of flatcars for transporting standard-gauge wagons known from narrow-gauge railway systems, fig. 2. This requires the use of special ramps for railway wagons.
c) shared tracks of different widths on certain sections of traffic, fig. 3.
The article comes from the magazine “Logistyka” 1/2004.