Schenker Rail invests EUR 410 m in new freight cars and locomotives

DB Schenker Rail, the Deutsche Bahn freight operator, will invest approx. EUR 410 million primarily in new freight cars and locomotives throughout Europe this year. his is a record amount which we plan to invest at exactly those points where there is increasing customer demand for our transport services and where modern equipment is required,explained Dr. Karl-Friedrich Rausch, Member of the Management Board of DB Mobility Logistics AG, responsible for Transportation and Logistics. The fleet modernization process currently concentrates on freight cars for the coal and steel sector and for the chemicals and automotive industries.

Roughly EUR 190 million will be spent on new freight cars and repairing the existing fleet, a further EUR 167 million will be invested in locomotives. The remaining funds will be spread between various investments in facilities and IT equipment. By the end of the year, some 1,472 new freight cars and 71 new locomotives will have been purchased for DB Schenker Rail, including 700 cars especially for coal and steel transports.

During the first half of 2010, DB Schenker Rail succeeded in raising the volume of transported freight to a total of 203 million tons. This was an increase of 58 million tons year-on-year or 40.1 percent. During that same period, traffic performance rose by 8.3 billion to 52.6 billion ton-kilometers, which is equivalent to an increase of 18.8 percent. There were particularly high increases in the transport of iron, ores and scrap metals.