Railfreight Distribution
The Railfreight Sectors were created towards the end of 1987 as a further development of the single Railfreight division created by BR in 1982 and existed until the onset of privatisation in 1994.
Railfreight was subdivided into six sub-sectors according to the commodity being transported. The Coal, Construction, Metals, and Petroleum sub-sectors handled trainloads of a specific commodity/group of commodities as described by their name, whilst non-trainload freight operations along with Freightliner and Intermodal services were assigned to Railfreight Distribution (RfD). Any operations not assigned to the other five Railfreight sub-sectors were assigned to Railfreight General, although this sub-sector was short lived being taken over by Railfreight Distribution during 1989.
The Railfreight sub-sectors operated until 1994, when, as part of the privatisation process of British Rail, the specific operations of each sub-sector were done away with and Railfreight was reformed into three regional general railfreight companies in preparation for selling off: Loadhaul, Mainline Freight & Transrail.
Launched on the 15th October 1987, Railfreight Distribution (RfD) was responsible for non-trainload freight operations, which included MOD traffic, china clay, automotive, grain, sand, timber, London Transport tube trains as well as freight operations through the Channel Tunnel and other miscellaneous traffic. Freightliner and Intermodal services were also initially included but this container traffic was transferred to BR’s Freightliner Ltd subsidiary in 1995.
Read MoreRailfreight was subdivided into six sub-sectors according to the commodity being transported. The Coal, Construction, Metals, and Petroleum sub-sectors handled trainloads of a specific commodity/group of commodities as described by their name, whilst non-trainload freight operations along with Freightliner and Intermodal services were assigned to Railfreight Distribution (RfD). Any operations not assigned to the other five Railfreight sub-sectors were assigned to Railfreight General, although this sub-sector was short lived being taken over by Railfreight Distribution during 1989.
The Railfreight sub-sectors operated until 1994, when, as part of the privatisation process of British Rail, the specific operations of each sub-sector were done away with and Railfreight was reformed into three regional general railfreight companies in preparation for selling off: Loadhaul, Mainline Freight & Transrail.
Launched on the 15th October 1987, Railfreight Distribution (RfD) was responsible for non-trainload freight operations, which included MOD traffic, china clay, automotive, grain, sand, timber, London Transport tube trains as well as freight operations through the Channel Tunnel and other miscellaneous traffic. Freightliner and Intermodal services were also initially included but this container traffic was transferred to BR’s Freightliner Ltd subsidiary in 1995.
