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DHB are most unlikely to enter the equation. Transhipping rail wagons from rail to ship and back again at the other side is very unlikely to happen again. British Rail built up a very substantial cross channel railway wagon trade using the SeaFrance Nord Pas de Calais in her original rail ferry configuration, running from a berth at the end of the Admiralty Pier to a berth in Dunkerque West. When the tunnel opened, with railway lines running under the sea, this operation was closed down. The NPC became a conventional RORO ferry, the Admiralty Pier berth was dismantled, the rail connection removed, the passenger Western Docks station converted into a cruise terminal and the sidings at the freight yard at Shakespeare Beach removed. The berth in Dunkerque West is still there but is boxed in by a later RORO berth.
The through rail freight operation via Eurotunnel has been a disaster and has dwindled year by year to a fraction of what was carried by British Rail. This is why the freight yard at Dollands Moor is virtually empty. In view of this calamitious handling of through freight via the direct tunnel rail link, DHB postulated some years ago that there might be an opening to run a rail ferry again but that it would require outside investment including rebuilding Shakespeare Tunnel to take rail wagons of the larger loading gauge required and obviously reinstating a rail connection and rail berth. The plans for Terminal 2 would need to be modified and the maximum traffic DHB contemplated would only be five percent of total port throughput.
The situation has now changed. Eurotunnel has been making major attempts to increase through rail traffic. From the outset, fifty percent of the paths through the tunnel have been required to be allocated to through rail freight trains and through Eurostar passenger trains with the other fifty percent used by Eurotunnel passenger and freight shuttles. The paths used by freight trains are now insignificant and those used by Eurostar far less than originally predicted so there is a great deal of spare capacity.
As we know, Eurotunnel was required to be built by private money and was a financial disaster and is now completely run by the French. BR was privatised and the major part of the rail freight division was handed over to EWS, which is now owned by Deutsche Bahn, the German nationalised railways. I think I am correct in saying that EWS and SNCF were jointly responsible for freight train operation through the tunnel and that Eurotunnel has now acquired its own specialised locomotives for operation in the tunnel and a licence to operate freight trains on European rails but haven't got time to look it up so Terry or JHG may care to confirm.
Freight trains from transhipment yards across Europe to similar ones in the UK, with only the local connection at either end handled by road, have always been seen as the rational and green alternative to individual lorries, each with their own driver, trundling all across Europe. This vision has always been stymied by a mixture of political and other factors but the EU has been knocking heads together and it could be that its time has finally come.