National statistics

Road goods vehicles travelling to Europe: July 2019 to June 2020

Published 13 August 2020

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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/road-goods-vehicles-travelling-to-europe-july-2019-to-june-2020/road-goods-vehicles-travelling-to-europe-july-2019-to-june-2020

Statistics on the number of trips made by road goods vehicles which travel from Great Britain to Europe between July 2019 and June 2020.

When comparing the 12-month period ending June 2020 to the 12-month period ending June 2019:

  • the total number of trips made by road goods vehicles travelling from Great Britain to Europe decreased by 10% to 3.1 million
  • the number of trips made by powered vehicles decreased by 10% to 2.1 million
  • the number of trips made by unaccompanied trailers decreased by 8% to 1 million

Of the 2.1 million powered vehicles that travelled from Great Britain to Europe:

  • the number of trips made by UK-registered vehicles decreased by 14% to 0.3 million
  • the number of trips made by foreign-registered vehicles decreased by 10% to 1.8 million

These statistics cover the period following the government’s announcement of measures to limit the impact and transmission of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. In early March 2020, the UK government set out four phases in its response to the coronavirus pandemic. The evolving situation around the world may have also impacted road goods vehicles trips prior to this stage. Coronavirus has had a wide impact on UK society and economic activity since March 2020.

As these data are affected by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in the UK, caution should be taken when interpreting these data and comparing them with previous time periods. Intelligence from industry reports suggests that a few Roll-on Roll-Off ferry routes ceased operating in the April to June 2020 period, whilst others only carried unaccompanied trailers. A fall in activity was seen across most of the routes surveyed.

The graph below shows the total number of trips made by road goods vehicles travelling from Great Britain to Europe each quarter since 2015, giving the number of trips in during the coronavirus pandemic period against the longer-term trend.

The graph shows the average number of trips over 2015 to 2019 as well as the expected variance from this average. The number of trips fall within the expected variance (± 1 standard deviation) for most quarters. There has been some wider variance (± 2 standard deviations of the average) in recent quarters, potentially impacted by logistics planning in the lead up to EU exit dates.

However, 2020 Quarter 2 (April to June) falls far below the expected variance showing the extent to which coronavirus may have impacted the activity of road goods vehicles travelling from Great Britain to Europe.

This chart shows the number of road goods vehicles travelling to Europe quarterly between 2015 and 2020.

Further information about these statistics is available, including:

We are trialling this compact HTML format for our quarterly roll-on roll-off international freight statistics releases, and we would like to hear your comments. If you have any feedback on our use of this format, please email roro.stats@dft.gov.uk.

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