The service will be bi-weekly, but the goal is to make it weekly in the short term. The train from Chengdu to Melzo (Milan) has a capacity of 40 containers. The traction has been entrusted to Mercitalia Rail.
On Saturday it departed the first freight train, which will regularly connect the markets of China and Italy. As anticipated by MF Shipping & Logistica on December 7th, the first train left Chengdu and, 18 days later, arrived at the rail hub of Melzo, at the Contship Italia Group. The railway service is operated by Far East Land Bridge Company, a company owned by Russian railways Rzd, and it is the first to regularly run between the two countries after a first successful test carried out a couple of months ago.
Initially the service frequency will be bi-weekly, but the short-term goal is to make it weekly. The capacity of the train is 40 containers and the traction in Italy is entrusted to the locomotives of Mercitalia Rail (the railway cargo company of the Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane group). The transit time is just over two weeks, and it travels a distance of about 10 thousand kilometers crossing Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland and Austria.
Due to the difference in track gauge between the European, Russian and Chinese rail systems, the train will have to do two technical stops during the journey on the border between Europe, China and Russia. The arrival of the train is expected in Melzo on 12 February, and 40% of the cargo will be destined to other destinations in Italy using the intermodal network of Hannibal (a company part of the Contship Group). In the coming weeks, carriers will be proposed to reach France and Switzerland using the active rail links from Melzo to Lyon and Frenkendorf.
The goods that can be carried on the train between Italy and China are widely varied, but this transport solution is especially suited to the products of the fashion, automotive and electronics industry. Thanks to this train, there is also a partnership between Mercitalia Rail and the United Transportation and Logistics Company (that is, like Felb, a subsidiary of the Russian railways Rzd). The partnership has been signed less than a year ago with the aim of developing the transport of containers by train between China and Europe.
(Source:Class Editori)
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