International News - Ikea Rail hits the buffers after 18 months

Ikea Rail is reaching the end of the line after just 18 months in operation.

The Swedish furniture giant established the rail supply route between Almhult and Duisberg in Germany in April 2001, and the first train ran in June last year. However, Ikea has decided to terminate the rail scheme in January next year.

An Ikea spokeswoman said: 'The capacity has not been utilised to its full extent on the Ikea Rail train. We are now looking for other solutions in order to continue to transport the goods.'

Ikea is committed to carrying goods by rail on environmental grounds, and trans-ports 18 per cent of goods this way. The Ikea train only carried 1 per cent of the rail cargo. 'This does not affect Ikea's goal to substantially increase the rail share of its total transportation of goods,' said the spokeswoman. Staff who manned the service will be redeployed internally.