Meet the innovator loading rail freight boxes at speed

Arteries, veins and capillaries occupy the thoughts of many medical professionals, but one experienced vet from Shropshire is considering how goods could be transported around urban areas in a similar manner to the flow of blood through vessels in a body.

Alan Holford is the founder of BoxTube, a start-up company which participated in year one of the Clean Futures Accelerator, led by Connected Places Catapult, to explore new green transport technology under development in the West Midlands.

Alan has created a rapid loading machine for crates – or ‘tote boxes’ – using multiple unique conveyance mechanisms to transfer goods onto trains and lorries quickly; securing them in large “chests of draws” on board to make the most efficient use of space.

Longer term, he plans to create a network of tunnels beneath cities to distribute parcels to – and collect residential waste from – multiple locations in a more timely manner compared to driving vehicles around the streets.

“I have always loved transport, vehicles and maps; and feel that engineering is very closely linked to science,” says Alan. “My idea is to create different sized freight tunnels beneath a city, which reminds me of how arteries, veins and capillaries are arranged in mammals.”

He adds that many world-changing innovations have been invented by someone originally working outside of an industry, “because their outside experiences and perspectives can combine with not being blinkered by doing things the way they’ve always been done”.

Alan credits an experience from when he was studying for his veterinary pathology degree for giving him the confidence to innovate in a new industry. He spent six months involved in human cancer research and brought a fresh pair of eyes to the work of the research team; coming up with “a tweak to the experiment design”.

Fellow researchers had modified a cold virus to attack cancer cells, for use alongside a chemotherapy drug. Alan suggested the virus be introduced 24 hours before the drug – rather than two hours, as was previously the case – because the theory suggested this might increase the cancer cells’ vulnerability to the chemotherapeutic drugs. Alan was encouraged to follow through with his suggestion in the experiments and found a 15% increase in the ‘kill rate’ of cancer cells.

“Armed with some research,” he says, “no-one should be shy about putting a suggestion forward.” Alan adds: “People from within the logistics and rail industries have been similarly encouraging and have welcomed me, an imposter from the veterinary industry, to contribute to solving the industry’s net zero challenges.”

Transferring from veterinary work to logistics

Alan has worked as a companion animal vet in Shropshire, Staffordshire and the West Midlands since 2010, both in permanent and locum roles. Despite this work being full time, he also explored other interests. During his early career, he worked on an idea for Longitude Radio: a station focused on science, maths and engineering. “I came up with the radio station idea while a locum vet; it was to feature presenters offering a scientific standard of journalism. But the idea of a radio station has been overtaken somewhat by podcasts.”

He later turned his attention to compiling crosswords and writing articles for veterinary journals in the UK, Australia and New Zealand; which also led him to publish a crossword book. For the last three years, he was also president of the Shropshire Veterinary Society. However, since 2018 he has been developing what is now his main passion: the BoxTube concept.

Alan’s interest in developing a new freight system was sparked after seeing how medicines were delivered to his veterinary practice in reusable tote boxes from a van driver, who picked up empty crates the next day. He was aware of efforts to develop drones for autonomous delivery which he says “will undoubtedly have lots of exciting applications, but could not be scaled to take on the quantity of freight transport functions that could significantly reduce inner city freight traffic”.

Instead, he developed the idea of a below ground means of transporting boxes around a city; recognising that tunnel diameters need to be small to keep costs down. “For every metre you increase the diameter of a tunnel,” he says, “the cost goes up four times”.

Alan spent many evenings and weekends sketching out his delivery network, before a chance meeting with a vet, Kevin Morris, who was also a businessman; looking to invest in emerging technology. Kevin became Alan’s mentor; encouraging him to see where his “ambitious idea” for BoxTube might take him.

After over a year of further development, Kevin and Alan co-founded BoxTube, with Kevin providing financial support and business experience to compliment Alan’s innovation, hard work and enthusiasm. After 15 months of development, Alan applied to the Clean Futures Accelerator; supporting himself with some part-time vet work. “But as soon as I started on the programme, it became apparent I needed to work on my idea full-time if I wanted to make the most of the opportunity.”

Mapping out a tunnel network

Alan’s decided to model a subterranean freight network on the West Midlands after travelling through the region tending to sick and injured animals. “I got to know Birmingham and its congestion problems, and decided to plot strategic locations for the BoxTube system, including large warehouses and commercial areas of the city, as well as links to the motorways. I joined them up on a map; drawing a series of large and small diameter tunnels and vertical access shafts.”

He recognises that such a large building programme would represent an expensive undertaking. “Yes, but there are so many advantages if I get this right. Not only could parcels be delivered to the corner of your street – and be stored for collection – but waste and recycling could be collected more efficiently, rather than once every two weeks.”

Alan suggests the tunnels are constructed by ‘jacking’ precast units into place under roads, to avoid causing disruption to motorists. He also says the cavities could accommodate utilities such as fibre optic cables, providing asset owners with a revenue stream.

“Such a network might cost £7.5 billion to build in the West Midlands, but generate annual revenues of £1.9 billion; a favourable rate of return compared to many infrastructure projects.” Alan adds he has received interest in his idea from the Middle East, from a city authority looking to build a metro system for passengers and freight.

Rapid loading system accelerated

Alongside his longer-term ambition for a regional tunnel network, Alan has developed his rapid freight loading system to transfer goods on to lorries and trains for long distance journeys by road or rail. Each tote box would feature a QR and radio frequency identification code so each box can be tracked.

He has also been working alongside Connected Places Catapult’s human centred design team to settle upon the best size of crate; to ensure people can handle them safely and efficiently. A working prototype of the machine was demonstrated this spring at the Black Country Innovative Manufacturing Organisation in Dudley, as part of a Clean Futures showcase. Alan recently entered into discussions with a pair of fellow participants on the cohort about exploring new ways of moving goods on and off trains, and is collaborating with a third.

He expects his rapid loading technology to reduce the time taken to load a lorry with goods by as much as 88%, and a train by 99.5%. Rail carriages used for this purpose could be coupled together in a dedicated freight train, or be paired alongside passenger carriages.

Carriages would be adapted to feature roller shutters along each side, he adds. For a train of 12 carriages, as many as 10,000 boxes waiting on multiple multi-level conveyors could be loaded from a platform within just 11 seconds, he suggests. For a lorry, Alan estimates that 550 tote boxes could be safely loaded in under a minute.

Loading rapidly offers multiple benefits, he adds. “Being able to switch loads so quickly between lorries and trains means that the most efficient transport mode can be used for each part of the journey, with trains being up to 95% lower emitting. On top of that, rapid loading makes it easier for empty lorries to pick up extra loads. We currently have three billion empty miles driven in the UK annually.”

He describes the Clean Futures Accelerator as being “absolutely transformative” for his business. “It provided a structure to help guide me towards a new goal. Connected Places Catapult has a huge network, with lots of expertise across different parts of industry. I’ve also been involved in the Freight Innovation Cluster and investor day events.

“I’ve talked to a couple of potential investors, and want to get to a point where my technology is developed so I can go to market and conduct live trials. Success for me would be having a solution operating commercially.”

To other innovators looking to follow in his footsteps, Alan advises: “Go for it, but be self-analytical. After coming up with an idea, you must try and find if there’s a reason it won’t work. When you can honestly say you have given your idea rigorous interrogation, and you think it passes, that will give you the self-belief you’ll need to keep going and crucially convince others to believe in you.”

Find out more about the Clean Futures Accelerator, and the Freight Innovation Cluster.