100,000 Southampton containers a year in new Freightliner deal
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• Multi-million pound contracts for the carriage of well over 100,000 containers a year for the next 10 years were signed in London on Monday in the presence of Mr John Peyton, Minister for Transport Industries. They provide for Freightliner train transport between various points in the UK and the containerships of Overseas Containers Ltd and Ben Line Containers Ltd (part of the Associated Container Transportation Ltd group) which will start to use the Port of Southampton in 1972.
The contracts provide for the running of six container trains each way every week-day exclusively for the consortia's maritime container movements in connection with their Far East services. The trains will connect the new containership terminal being built by British Transport Docks Board for OCL and ACT at Southampton with Birmingham, Glasgow (Coatbridge), Leeds, Liverpool, London and Manchester.
These contracts are the outcome of many months of collaboration between the private sector consortia OCL and ACT and Freightliners Ltd, British Railways Board and British Transport Docks Board, To cater for the business Freightliners Ltd is building a new terminal at the Port of Southampton adjacent to the OCL and ACT containership berths and another in London (Barking), with associated customs clearance facilities provided by a Containerbase Federation company. BR will provide the motive power and new wagons for the service. The existing Freightliner terminal at Southampton (Mil(brook), which has been open just over three years, will be retained for general buss nes s.
In full swing, the contracts will add well over 100.000 additional containers a year to Freightliners' volume which already exceeds half a million annually. The facilities provided under them will allow for the expansion of carryings should other containership services be centred on Southampton in the future.
Freightliners Ltd already provides daily services for the Australian trade containcrships run by OCL and ACT through Tilbury, now handling some 1000 containers per week. The total is expected to rise, later in the year. . when additional facilities are available at the PLA container terminal.