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TRAIN TRAVEL

Money-losing BLS Cargo lays off 80 workers

BLS Cargo, Switzerland’s largest private rail freight company, is laying off 70 to 80 employees after failing to reach a rate deal with German company DB Schenker Rail.

Money-losing BLS Cargo lays off 80 workers
BLS Cargo train hauling trucks from Germany to Italy. Photo: BLS Cargo

The deal aimed to stem losses on the Bern-based company’s trains running through the Gotthard tunnel.

Starting in 2014, BLS Cargo will operate 10 fewer trains daily through the tunnel.

As a result, 60 locomotive drivers will lose their jobs.

BLS Cargo, which specializes in hauling freight through the Alps, lost 1.85 million francs in 2012.

The company blamed low prices and the strong value of the franc against the euro for the loss, in addition to high rail access rates for the red ink.

Directly and indirectly, BLS Cargo employs about 400 people.

The company says that it cooperates closely with DB Schenker Rail for joint cross-border arrangements that involve planning the use of locomotives and drivers together.

BLS Cargo is majority owned by BLS AG, a transport group that operates passenger trains, buses and boats in Central Switzerland.

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TRAVEL NEWS

Swedish government shelves plans for two fast train links

Sweden's government has called for a halt to planning to faster train links between Gothenburg and Borås and Jönköping and Hässleholm, in a move local politicians have called "a catastrophe".

Swedish government shelves plans for two fast train links

In an announcement slipped out just before Christmas Eve, the government said it had instructed the Swedish Transport Administration to stop all planning for the Borås to Gothenburg link, stop the ongoing work on linking Hässleholm and Lund. 

“The government wants investments made in the railway system to first and foremost make it easier for commuting and cargo traffic, because that promotes jobs and growth,” infrastructure minister Andreas Carlson said in a press release. “Our approach is for all investments in the railways that are made to be more cost effective than if the original plan for new trunk lines was followed.” 

Ulf Olsson, the Social Democrat mayor in Borås, told the TT newswire that the decision was “a catastrophe”. 

“We already have Sweden’s slowest railway, so it’s totally unrealistic to try to build on the existing railway,” he said. We are Sweden’s third biggest commuting region and have no functioning rail system, and to release this the day before Christmas Eve is pretty symptomatic.”

Per Tryding, the deputy chief executive for the Southern Sweden Chamber of Commerce, complained that the decision meant Skåne, Sweden’s most southerly county, would now have no major rail infrastructure projects. 

“Now the only big investment in Skåne which was in the plan is disappearing, and Skåne already lay far behind Gothenburg and Stockholm,” he said.

“This is going to cause real problems and one thing that is certain that it’s going to take a very long time, whatever they eventually decide. It’s extremely strange to want to first suspend everything and then do an analysis instead of doing it the other way around.”  

The government’s instructions to the transport agency will also mean that there will be no further planning on the so-called central parts of the new planned trunk lines, between Linköping and Borås and Hässleholm and Jönköping. 

Carlson said that the government was prioritising “the existing rail network, better road standards, and a build-out of charging infrastructure”.

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