Three Bridges ROC - London Bridge south side signalling workstation.
Rail Engineer • January 2017
59
CLIVE KESSELL
The Digital Railway M
a reappraisal
uch has been written on the Digital Railway project since it was initiated back in 2014. Not all of this has been complimentary, with critics believing the objectives to be overstated or even unattainable. However, the project is still very much ongoing and, with a new leader in place, a much greater degree of realism is being injected to ensure that the original goals can be maintained but re-assessed as to their priority and timeframe. Rail Engineer spoke recently with Digital Railway’s managing director David Waboso, who has been in post since June 2016. David joined Network Rail from Transport for London where, as capital programmes director, he had been instrumental in getting much-needed new technology introduced to enable greater capacity to be achieved on the DLR, Victoria, Northern and Jubilee lines. These projects were not easy to implement, with considerable disruption having to be endured, but much was learnt about how to deliver complex technology on busy operational lines. As such, David is a pragmatist and brings with him the experience of how to deploy new systems within a practical and logical plan.
Digital Railway objectives It is perhaps timely to review the objectives for the digital railway. While the broader vision for the railway remains as originally defined, David has brought a much more pragmatic focus to the work of the Digital Railway programme. To drive capacity, performance and safety, focus is targeted on much-improved command and control technology covering ERTMS/ETCS, ATO (Automatic Train Operation), TMS (Traffic Management Systems), C-DAS (Connected Driver Advisory Systems) and, of course, telecoms. This work links in with the broader industry goals of intelligent trains and infrastructure, leading to remote condition monitoring, smart meters on trains, energy supply resilience, and quicker and effective failure recovery situations. Improved passenger information and associated facilities are
also in the mix, including ticketing, reservations, train running information accuracy and immediacy, train loading data, linkage to the internet and social media. All these embrace the whole railway, not just Network Rail, and a fully integrated industry team is vital to eventual success. Key will be the participation of the Rail Delivery Group, the train operating companies including freight and, perhaps most important of all, the supply chain. With the latter, confidence has been low and the need for greater engagement is recognised. Giving the Rail Supply Group and its many contractors greater accountability, with an enhanced relationship in the long-term projects, is part of the plan. Any scheme under the
Digital Railway banner must contain, almost by definition, significant investment in software, and this has proved to be a troublesome element in the past. An important part of getting software right will be to properly specify the functional and operational requirements, “Don’t start writing code until you know what you want”, as David puts it. So what are the main thrusts of the Digital Railway in terms of specific projects? There are no real surprises but there is now a much better recognition of what each element entails.
ETCS (European Train Control System) To get more capacity and improved performance out of the existing railway is a cornerstone of the Digital Railway remit. This is not new but, given the increasing capacity crunch on key parts of the railway, the need is now urgent. As a part of ERTMS, ETCS has proved to be a difficult concept at European level and dates back to the early 1990s. Conceived partly as Three Bridges ROC - a controller's view.