Jerusalem Post web-site:
From London: China is launching its first freight train service to London from Yiwu, a famed wholesale market town in the eastern province of Zhejiang, the Xinhua news agency reported.The train will travel for 18 days over more than 7,500 miles to reach Britain from China, Xinhua said. It will pass through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany, Belgium and France before arriving in London.
Former British Prime Minister David Cameron raised some eyebrows with allies by pitching Britain as the pre-eminent gateway to the West for investment from China and proposing to make London the main international trading center for offshore yuan.
Prime Minister Theresa May has said the relationship with China remains "golden" as she seeks to bring in billions of dollars in Chinese investment as Brtiain leaves the European Union.
This trip has to include at least two transshipments from standard gauge to Russian gauge, and back, plus lots of locomotive changes and crews, different electrification standards, etc.
Not all kinds of freight are suitable for such a complex and costly treatment.
N.F.
I would think that as long as freight is in containers the gauge changes should be easy. Simply transfer the containers over to flats on an adjacent track. That avoids the complexities of a large fleet of cars capable of changing wheel gauge and fully compatible with varying brake systems, clearance diagrams and such. From the shipper's perspective it will still be rail all the way. And the transfers will be simpler than the American practice of interchanging some intermodal traffic across Chicago by road.
John
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