Let’s call him Bruno. The man is a micro-patron, operator of a small business of freight rail installed in the east of France. Bruno is cornered. Its structure with less than ten employees and less than € 5 million turnover will need to, ” he says, file for bankruptcy. “We cut the legs, despairs the contractor. On all of my losses due to the strike of the railway workers against the railway reform, this spring – more than a quarter of my turnover, the SNCF Network repays me only 10 %. “
In this sector of the freight train, Bruno is not the only one suffering from the unprecedented movement against the pact rail. If all of the freight operators private are not, like Bruno, led them to bankruptcy, all have suffered cruel losses of exploitation that could undermine long term. And all the eyes are riveted on the final negotiations of their representatives with the SNCF about the final amount of compensations that could make the group public railway, are crucial to the future of smaller players in the freight.
To understand the situation, let’s go back to the problem : the social movement against the reform of railway, thirty-six days of strike action spread out between late march and late June. The freight trains have suffered cancellations of courses by the dozens. And the operational mode of movement – two days every five days – disrupted the circulations, including the days of non-strike. Fret SNCF and its private competitors – the market for the transport of goods by rail is open in France since 2003 – have been particularly affected.
In the freight private, we distinguish between two categories of actors
The Association française du rail (AFRA), which represents rail operators a real alternative to the TRAIN, then quickly turned to the SNCF Network, the entity of the SNCF, which manages the tracks, assigns the rights of movement…
