A newly built central hub of the Dutch EURODIS member PostNL now is functioning as the central gate for every EURODIS-shipment to and from the Netherlands.
„Thanks to the new hub we could increase capacity as well as performance for our Dutch imports and exports“, says Christian Knoblich. He is Managing Director of EURODIS GmbH, Weinheim, steering the international transport network for parcels and pallets covering 36 European countries. „The hub in Nieuwegein features a new operational concept and an innovative process which both are accelerating the handling in the hub. The hub is better located to our international hub in Cologne where all shipments to the Netherlands are consolidated.“
To boost the efficiency of the hub the whole logistics centre which is 9,400 square metres large is spread up into three separate parts. The first part functions as a pure parcelengine. Around six metres above ground a high speed sorter moves up to 8,500 parcels per hour. The space beyond the parcel belt is used to transport parcels already sorted and packed into corlettes for national delivery to the right truck gate. The second part of the hub is dedicated to cross docking. Parcels are unloaded from the trucks which brought them from their region of origin and are loaded into the trucks heading to the destination. The third part of the hub is dedicated to temperature controlled shipments and cargo and encompasses 1,400 square metres. This is where all the EURODIS shipments are handled.
Complete delivery of all items of a shipment
„PostNL secures that a EURODIS consignee receives all the items of his shipment in one delivery“, adds Knoblich. Being a specialist for combi-freight, EURODIS shipments may consist out of parcels, pallets and even hazardous goods not restrained to limited quantities. In the cargo handling area in Nieuwegein part of the shipments are loaded into trucks bringing the shipments directly to the consignees. Shipments with an address in more remote Dutch areas are moved onto trailer trucks heading to the delivery depot next to the destination. Knoblich complements: „Pure parcel shipments with the exemption of hazardous goods can be quickly moved from the cargo area to the parcel sorter and delivered through the efficient parcel network of PostNL. Besides the most modern sortation technology the concept of dividing up the different flows of goods to separate sortation areas has increased the performance of the new hub significantly.“ The new logistics centre has brought around 450 jobs to the area. There are more than 40 gates for trucks and 48 gates for delivery vehicles.
More capacity in the network
More and more parcels are sent in the Netherlands every year. In 2016, for example, PostNL delivered 177 million parcels, an increase of 13 percent. The central location of the new parcel processing and distribution centre in Nieuwegein contributes to the national coverage required to guarantee deliveries throughout the country. Because consumers are also ordering large goods, such as garden furniture, online to an increasing extent, this distribution centre features additional facilities for large parcels that do not fit in the processing machine.
Sipke Spoelstra, Director Logistics Solutions at PostNL: "In order to respond to the growth of e-commerce, we have invested in our parcels and logistics infrastructure. Based in Nieuwegein, we deliver parcels to local consumers as well as companies, wholesalers, hospitals and pharmacies throughout the country. We can serve a large part of our online market from this location.”
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Around 450 people are working in the newly built hub in Nieuwegein, which is the central gate for all the EURODIS shipments to and from the Netherlands.
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