10TH ANNIVERSARY\\\ >> 14 CMA


Maersk.


CGM, Maersk and MSC later announced plans for a P3 operational alliance on east- west trades, which in the event proved to be short-lived. The plan later ran into opposition from shippers, who argued that the new grouping would have too much market share. In mid-2014, MSC and Maersk announced that they would launch a new M2 alliance, but not including CMA CGM, whose inclusion in the grouping had been opposed by the Chinese competition authorities. Mergers were also in the air


in the express sector, although UPS’s mooted purchase of TNT was ultimately to fall foul of European Commission rulings. TNT would eventually find a new home with rival operator FedEx Express, in 2015. Meanwhile London St


Issue 4 2020 - Freight Business Journal


15


capacity by redeveloping life-expired buildings, while adding up to 40 new daily flights. In the same issue, Emirates


Skycargo said it had started operations at the brand new Dubai World Central gateway.


Freighters on the wane A sign of the times in the


airfreight market was the decision in autumn 2014 by Air France-KLM-Martinair to drastically scale back its all- cargo fleet, reducing it from 14 freighters in 2013 to just five, based in Paris and Amsterdam. Germany’s Lufthansa was


operation, taking its cue from DSV that had announced similar plans to develop a hub- and-spoke continental system. Russell Group’s terminal in


threatened to wipe out the cattle industry. Europe/South Africa


consortium SAECS announced that it would be the first line


be many months before a workable solution was arrived at.


Late in the year, road


movements to and from Russia were nearly paralysed as the country’s federal customs service imposed a ban on TIR movements. The restrictions were not to be lifted until many months later, in 2015. As might be expected,


movie reviews make up only a very small percentage of FBJ’s editorial content, but an exception was made in the last issue of 2013 for Sony Pictures’ Captain Phillips. The film also starred the Maersk Alabama and a group of Somalis, cast as pirates. Early in 2014, Brittany Ferries


Pancras station hosted a mocked-up express freight train being promoted by the Euro Carex consortium of express freight companies, forwarders and airfreight companies. Eight years on, we are still waiting for the first scheduled service. Peel Ports announced that


its new Liverpool2 terminal would be ready to handle its first ships in 2016. Rival port Felixstowe lost no time in starting work on its own enlargement plans, including a third rail terminal. In March 2012, the European


Commission cracked down hard on the freight industry, fining 14 airfreight forwarders for price-fixing, a process that was to trigger a series of appeals and counter-actions over the next few years. Mid-year, Pall-Ex announced


plans to transform its domestic-only pallet delivery network into a pan-European


Barking, East London hosted the UK’s first ever continental piggyback freight train of trailers lifted on and off rail flatcars. However, all was not rosy regarding international freight – Eurotunnel boss Jacques Gounon complained later that growth was being strangled by a lack of capacity on the French rail network.


Sheffield opens inland terminal


South Yorkshire opens its first purpose-built international freight


terminal at Grange


Mill Lane, near junction 34 of the M1. It aims to tap into traffic that currently operates via places such as Leeds or Manchester. Mid-year, Nolan Transport


and other Irish haulage firms come to the rescue of the country’s farmers, moving truckloads of hay to make up for a fodder shortage that


to serve the new London Gateway port, in 2013. Plans for containers to be


weighed at ports meanwhile got a mixed reception from shippers and shipping lines. The aim was to obtain more accurate weights of stuffed boxes


and hence improve safety. However, it was to


said it had become the first ferry line operating in British waters to order ships powered by liquefied natural gas, a plan that was to be realised from 2020 onwards. On 14 April 2014, the


European Commission published a report calling for more liberalisation in the truck cabotage market and


Over in Kent, airfreight


gateway Manston Airport mounted a last-ditch battle for survival that was to prove ultimately unsuccessful, although


been an attempt to reopen the gateway. A couple of months later,


Heathrow Airport unveiled a master plan to double cargo


lately there has


continued to dredge the estuary for its new Liverpool2 terminal, cross-Channel freight operators reported that they were under siege from migrants attempting to get from Calais to Dover. In one incident, 85 people tried to storm their way aboard the Berlioz ferry on 3 September. New technology and new


rules for dangerous goods in airfreight were much discussed in autumn 2014, but the news that caught most peoples’ attention was the decision by the Department for Transport to ‘sack’ all the UK’s explosive sniffer dogs, claiming they were not doing their job properly. They were not to be reinstated until several years afterwards, following an extensive retraining programme. The British International


Freight Association (BIFA) welcomed Robert Keen as its new director general, taking


18 >>


the removal of a number of ‘archaic’ restrictions including the limit on the number of cabotage journeys drivers can perform in any one week.


– and is - major operator of both passenger and freighter aircraft, a position it was to maintain over the next few years despite some downsizing of its freighter fleet. While the port of Liverpool


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