Norbert Dentressangle, is to use the River Seine to transport goods to 80 stores in Paris for convenience retailer Franprix.
From September, Dentressangle will manage the transport of 26 containers, each containing 450 pallets, by barge every day – from the river port in Bonneuil-sur-Marne to the centre of Paris.
The barges will cover 20km of the Seine, passing through two locks in Créteil and St-Maurice, before reaching the centre of Paris.
The port in Bourdonnais in the 7th arrondissement will be adapted to receive the barges, which will be unloaded by crane and the goods transferred to trucks for final delivery to stores by Dentressangle.
Dentressangle calculates that every container transported by river represents a saving of 10,000 km of road transport per year. In 2013, 48 containers will be delivered per day, equivalent to a saving of 450,000 km per year.
Hervé Montjotin, managing director of Norbert Dentressangle’s Transport Division said: “This initiative is fully in line with the philosophy of our company, which is to operate in a sustainable manner and reduce the impact of our activities on the environment, both through the use of the latest technology to improve the productivity and environmental performance of our vehicles and the provision of innovative solutions, such as the one we are providing for Franprix.”
