ferry van

English edit

A British Rail standard ferry van from the 1960s

ferry van (plural ferry vans)

(rail transport, UK, dated) A railway goods van intended for train ferry traffic to and from continental Europe.
- 1964 January, “News and Comment: Dr. Beeching and the exporters”, in Modern Railways, page 2:
  More than one exporter had complained that ferry vans were in desperately short supply and that the B.R. fleet of 400 new vans (over 150 of which are now in service) would fall far short of immediately foreseeable requirements. [...] The solution to the exporters' demand for more stock of this kind, it was said, lay in the quicker turnround of the Continental ferry wagons bringing imports to this country.
- 2018, Andy Gibbs, The Southern Region in the 1970s and 1980s, Amberley Publishing →ISBN [1]:
  A grey morning in Tonbridge in 1977 sees No. 33208 rattle through the station with a long train of ferry vans and wagons from the train ferry at Dover.