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North East-based PD Ports has celebrated the success of its second daily rail freight connection to Scotland, with an official locomotive naming ceremony at Teesport.

Five years after the launch of the Company’s Intermodal Rail Terminal at Teesport, the investment has taken the port from strength to strength, with Teesport now offering more daily connections to Scotland than any other port in the North, following a second Scottish service being added, due to customer demand.

The ceremony that took place on Thursday April 25th celebrated PD Ports’ commitment to rail freight and customer service. Attended by senior representatives from the service’s key partners including DB Cargo, ECS Containers and P&O Ferries, the event saw the unveiling of the newly co-branded

PD Ports and DB Cargo locomotive, which was officially named the ‘Teesport Express’.

Frans Calje, CEO at PD Ports said:

“Today’s loco naming is a fantastic opportunity to celebrate the great progress we’ve made and outline our plans for the future. Continuing to expand and strengthen our rail freight offering is important to us as rail provides vital UK connections for our customers and delivers environmental and cost-saving benefits. We’d like to thank our partners who have worked with us to make this service possible, and we look forward to a strong, ongoing relationship. These partnerships have laid the foundation for us to integrate our services, allowing us to offer faster and more frequent transit between Scotland and the continent to benefit our customers.”

Hans-Georg Werner, CEO from DB Cargo UK said:

“We are delighted to celebrate such a significant milestone alongside our partners PD Ports. We originally started out running just one service for PD Ports to our terminals at Mossend and Grangemouth in Scotland, however demand was such that in October last year we agreed to run a second service as well. Today’s loco naming is a celebration of our successful partnership which I hope will continue to grow and will ensure the safe, speedy and sustainable delivery of goods to key markets like Scotland. Together we are stronger, and I look forward to continuing our positive relationship to support the agenda for better rail freight connectivity across the North of the UK.”

Pieter Balcaen, chief executive of ECS & 2XL (European Logistics Group), added:

“Our mission is to create sustainable and reliable logistics, which means that we focus on sustainable transport and multi-modal solutions to add value to our customers.

“The Teesport Rail initiative started four years ago, with a reliable level of service from day one; recent Scotland 2 has created additional rail capacity which is enabling us to further develop and strengthen our rail connections to and from Scotland.”

Nick Pank, P&O Ferries’ Head of Freight – North Sea, said:

“Today’s announcement represents another major step forward in the service we can offer our customers, for whom Teesport is the most reliable way to transport goods to or from northern Britain. The 15 hour sailing is more cost efficient than more northerly routes and by integrating our timetable with PD Ports’ expanded rail links to Scotland we can guarantee an unrivalled service to anyone with logistics requirements to or from Glasgow and Edinburgh.”