Bosphorus Europe Express: your gateway to Turkey
Connection between Turkey and Slovenia and other countries of the European Union is an important part of the tenth Pan-European corridor, so the quality of transport services is even more important. A bright future is expected for the railways as the trade flows from Turkey to Europe and vice versa may generate full train loads and container cargo.
Container terminals Ljubljana in Slovenia and Halkali in Istanbul, Turkey, seem to be on the right path to fulfil the increasing market demand. Ljubljana offers good connections to the Port of Koper, as well to Italy, Austria, Germany and the Benelux countries. On the other side, Halkali connects well to the hinterland in Turkey, to the Mediterranean and Black Sea ports, as well to Asia. Last but not least, the environmental benefits and savings generated by the railways are also huge.
Slovenske železnice in partnership with AdriaKombi and Kombiverkehr, offering services to customers in Slovenia, Germany and Turkey, started to operate on the route Ljubljana –Halkali (Instanbul) in 2008. The transported volumes have increased and by April 2010 three trains a week have been running from Ljubljana to Turkey. The product is called Bosphorus Europe Express and is a result of the co-ordinated efforts of railway undertakings and infrastructure managers of Slovenian, Croatian, Serbian, Bulgarian, and Turkish Railways.
The partners’ goal is to reduce the transit time and to offer customers even more competitive railway services between Europe and Turkey. In 2008, the partners analysed the possibilities for improving the train’s transit time. They targeted on how to increase the train’s speed and how to optimise activities at border stations. A contribution to the transit time reduction at the test run in March 2010 was possible by the introduction of an interoperable multi-system locomotive and diesel locomotive, which was offered by MRCE Dispolok. Under these specific conditions the promotional train reached its destination within 35 hours.
The test run of the train Bosphorus Europe Express showed that only by working very closely railway operators can be competitive in comparison to the road and maritime transportation. The test run had been given a priority on the entire route, but did not interfere to the priority of passenger trains. The merit for such a successful outcome (1597 km in 35 hours) goes clearly to the optimization of technological processes at the borders. Beside the railwaymen of the participating railways, i.e. infrastructure managers and successive carriers, there had been also an active involvement of public authorities, i.e. customs, police and inspection services.
Actually, the train covers a distance of 1577 km in approximately 50 hours, which means in 10 hours less than in March 2009. Although this can be regarded as a good result, the partner railways are still aiming to improve the quality of their services on the tenth Pan-European corridor, and to increase their competitiveness. A further improvement in terms of transit time, the goal is 30 hours, will be possible once the railway infrastructure on the entire route will be improved, the interconnection of electronic data exchange set up and the technical and commercial confidence completed. All these improvements have been set as a long-term goal.
