Swiss Alpine rail freight moved 12.3 million tonnes in the first half of 2026, a 3.1% increase over the same period last year, according to the Swiss Federal Office for Transport (FOT). The number could have been higher. The FOT said outright that infrastructure works limited growth on the corridor that carries the freight heart of north-south European rail flows.

The split between the two Alpine crossings tells the story of where the capacity actually was. Volumes on the Gotthard axis rose 8.4%, adding roughly 780,000 tonnes. The Lötschberg-Simplon axis went the other way, shedding 15.3%, or about 410,000 tonnes. The result is a sharp rebalancing of traffic share: Gotthard now handles 81.4% of transalpine rail freight, up four percentage points, while Simplon's share fell to 18.6%.

Both growth segments gained

Growth came from the two segments carriers and shippers watch most closely on this route. Single wagonload (SWL) traffic, a segment that has faced alarming declines in Switzerland in recent periods, grew 9.9% against H1 2025. Unaccompanied combined transport, the segment that competes directly with road for continental flows, gained 7.1%, or around 630,000 tonnes.

The FOT identified two drivers behind the combined transport gain, drawing on stakeholder feedback. First, the situation in Germany — long a bottleneck for transit traffic — eased slightly. Second, the expected positive economic development in Europe and Switzerland stabilised demand.

"As freight transport also carries a large share of the intermediate goods used in industrial production, this is expected to result in modest growth in rail freight volumes," the FOT said. But the office issued a warning alongside the optimism: planned infrastructure works in Germany could undo the easing and put that growth at risk. For shippers routing traffic through Switzerland into Italy and beyond, German construction planning remains the single biggest variable.

The closure calendar bit hard

The Lötschberg-Simplon axis was fully closed from 29 May to 27 July 2026, and additional closure periods totalling 80 days are scheduled across the full year. Renovation work in the Simplon Tunnel between Brig and Domodossola has further cut capacity for freight on the axis. The FOT was blunt that reduced infrastructure availability and poor reliability of long-distance transalpine rail freight prevented bigger gains.

The commercial consequence is straightforward. Shippers with routing flexibility shifted to Gotthard; those locked into Simplon-served origins and destinations absorbed delays and capacity constraints. For forwarders selling rail products on the corridor, the 80-day closure programme means 2026 is a year of managing expectations rather than promising reliability.

Operators diverge sharply

Market shares among the transalpine operators moved materially. SBB Cargo International extended its lead, growing 7.2% to a 44.1% share. Its domestic sister company SBB Cargo went in the opposite direction, losing 10.2% and now holding just 7.1% of the market — a continuation of the pressure on the domestic single wagonload-heavy operator.

BLS Cargo stayed in second place with a 20.6% share but gave up 6.1%. The biggest gainer was DB Cargo, which moved into third place with a 16.4% share on growth of 11.6% — an outlier performance for an operator that has spent recent years retrenching across its network. Whether DB Cargo can hold that transalpine momentum through Germany's own construction calendar is the open question.

For the second half of 2026, the trajectory hinges on two things the FOT itself flagged: the pace of the remaining Simplon closure days within the 80-day programme, and whether German infrastructure works resume at a scale that again chokes the approaches to the Alps.