Express parcel delivery operator Chronopost has more than tripled its sorting capacity to 35,000 parcels per hour at its Nord Ile-de-France hub following a €50m (US$52m) expansion project.
The upgraded facility also includes new infrastructure to help the company effectively process a wide range of packages, including out-of-home, non-standard packages and temperature-controlled food and health packages.
“Investments at the Nord Ile-de-France hub reflect our long-term commitment to meet the growing needs of our customers for all types of packages and for all markets,” confirmed Chronopost‘s president, Benoît Frette. “Thanks to the €50m [US$52m] invested in this new site and our territorial network, Chronopost has a network capable of absorbing the growth of its volumes until 2030, estimated at +45%.”
With a sorting capacity of more than 35,000 parcels per hour, compared with 10,000 before the work, the Nord Ile-de-France hub can process up to 600,000 packages per day during peak activity, making it Chronopost’s most efficient site – the Chilly-Mazarin hub handles 546,000 parcels per day in peak and will continue to play a fundamental role in the network.
Infrastructure investments
The increased capacity has been made possible thanks to several elements, including:
- A larger site area – 18,000m² now, compared with 10,000m² previously, excluding offices;
- The transition from one to two sorters for classic parcels, with higher sorting speeds and six-sided readers, allowing parcel data to be scanned and analyzed more quickly regardless of the package’s position on the sorting system;
- A new dedicated sorter for small packages, which can process about 70,000 parcels per day, as well as an automated bagging process to increase productivity when loading packages;
- A mechanized handling system for non-standard packages, with automatic reading of parcel barcodes and capture of weight and volume data.
Temperature-controlled handling
The Nord Ile-de-France site has more than 1,400m² of separate cold rooms dedicated to Chronofresh and Chronopost Healthcare for the handling and distribution of temperature-controlled food and health products.
With the cold rooms in service, the Nord Ile-de-France hub can also become a supplementary site during peak activity for controlled temperature products, complementing the two Chilly-Mazarin hubs dedicated to controlled temperature, which opened in 2023.