Western Gateway STB is working in partnership with Peninsula Transport to addresses the freight challenges, opportunities, and priorities for the South West over the next 30 years to 2050. In 2022, the South West Freight Strategy was published to set out the region’s objectives for freight, with a focus on the environment, economy, and society.
During 2022/23, work was carried out on a range of interventions, including a review of port terminals in the South West and lorry parking. We also established and ran the first South West freight forum. More information can be found in the South-West-Freight-Strategy-Year-1 Monitoring-Report.
In 2023/24, progress was made on a number of areas, which included running a backloading trail for SMEs to ‘pair up’ so they don’t run empty loads, research into unsuitable HGV routes, and imagining solutions to known areas that suffer from bridge strikes. More can be found on the – Freight Strategy – Year 2 monitoring report.
The plan for this financial year 2045/25 is to continue running the freight forums, but with more emphasis on public sector engagement. We will look to run separate freight awareness campaigns and workshops for local authority officers and members. We’ll also commit to further investigating potential sites for rail freight terminals in the South West.
Our next freight forum will be on Thursday 5th December, where Port of Poole will talk about all things maritime freight.
Fancy getting involved with freight? Get in touch with us at westerngatewaystb@westofengland-ca.gov.uk to share suggestions or get an invite to the freight forums.
