A Wine Rack on Rails? U.K. Businesses Seek Solutions to Shortages.

[David Benton]

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/28/worl ... tages.html
Cheers !
"TILBURY, England — It is called the “wine train,” and every weekend it rumbles out of the port of Tilbury, east of London, on a 100-mile journey to a depot in central England. It looks pretty much like any other freight train, but it carries an unusual cargo: Almost 650,000 bottles of wine."

I also wonder how the China to Europe trains are doing , given the high cost of shipping and driver shortages at the moment. ??? Packed to the gills , I'd imagine.

[kato]

I also wonder how the China to Europe trains are doing , given the high cost of shipping and driver shortages at the moment. ??? Packed to the gills , I'd imagine.

There are new additional connections between primarily Shenzhen and Duisburg (run by Shenzhen Huashang International Supply Chain Service - the regular weekly Shenzhen-Duisburg route is run by Sinotrans). Started earlier this month, planned to expand to possibly a few trains per week.

This is mostly for shipping of christmas present goods for e-commerce companies in the Greater Bay Area though, and not a permanent thing. Apparently these companies usually ship this specific cargo in September/October, but pandemic-related shortages in international shipping (fourth wave in Europe in October) made that partly impossible. The train is used as a much cheaper alternative to air freight in this case.