Vako Logistik, RCA and Hödlmayr put BMW onto rail

Railway logistics: Turkish BMW importer will receive about 9,000 new cars on block trains from Schwertberg to Tekirdag in 2015

Rail Cargo Austria and Hödlmayr Logistics Austria had been able to convince the BMW importer in Turkey with an innovative logistics concept. This means a weekly scheduled blocktrainsystem will be run for the first time and carry the vehicles from Schwertberg to the harbour city of Tekirdag, situated about 100 kilometers west of Istanbul. The Hödlmayr truck fleet takes over delivery to Schwertberg as well as further transport in Turkey.

This way around 200 vehicles a week come from the BMW plant in southern Bavaria to Turkey,“ explains Andreas Sundl, Managing Director of Hödlmayr Logistics Austria and  one of the initiators of the cooperation project. Preparatory work took about one year, including three test runs in which transit time, load factors and organizational bureaucratic „hurdles“ were examined for the 1.8000-kilometer railway transport across five states.

„Regarding the costs we had to reach for our limits in order to keep up with the normal sea transport of the vehicles. Finally, however, the advantages of our concept prevailed,“ said Andreas Sundl. Thus, for example, the transport time is reduced by three to four days, which has a positive effect on the costs of capital commitment. The transport process is easy to calculate for the customer, there is no risk of any waiting times in ports.

„So far, transport to Turkey by block trains had only be seen as an alternative if some extraordinary weather conditions have affected the smooth sea transportation,“ says Joachim Kemmler, Managing Director Vako Logistik, the logistics partner of the Turkish BMW importer. However, the changing freight costs and the congestion of Turkish ports provide for changes in circumstances that are now reflected in this new logistics concept.

www.hoedlmayr.com

Quelle: LogEastics
Portal: www.logistik-express.com