Study for potential South West freight terminal under way

A feasibility study for a potential freight terminal in the Avonmouth area is under way.

The Western Gateway Sub-national Transport Body is working with Peninsula Transport, with the support of local authorities, to establish an intermodal terminal in the South West to help drive modal shift.

“It’s quite apparent there’s not a big terminal in the whole of the South West for intermodal traffic,” explained Hattie James, the body’s Transport Officer.

At present the nearest terminals to the South West are in and around Birmingham.

She said it became apparent that Avonmouth “was a good place to start with” with businesses such as Amazon, Next and Tesco all having major hubs in the area. Local businesses, and social enterprise group SevernNet (which represents them) are also said to be supportive.

James White, the body’s Technical Lead, added that the South West’s freight growth target for the end of CP7 in 2029 is 6.9% compared to 7.5% nationally.

He said industry figures have warned the region “is in danger of missing out as it won’t have the facilities to encourage freight onto rail”.

Polaris Consultancy has been appointed to carry out a feasibility study in the Avonmouth area. The firm is due to present initial findings in September.

Funding exists only for the study, with any more money dependant on what’s reported by Polaris.

A potential second site further into the South West could also be explored in the near future, although that would be behind work at Avonmouth.

Intermodal rail traffic is currently growing in the UK.

Office of Rail and Road data showed intermodal maritime traffic reached a six-year high between April 2024 and March 2025 with a net tonne kilometre total of 6.315 billion.

That was an 8% year-on-year increase. International maritime traffic made up 38% of all freight moved during the year.