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ERTMS EUROSIG - Final Summary ReportProject Co-ordinator:
Partners:
ALCATEL SEL ALSTOM Belgium ANSALDO CSEE TRANSPORT SASIB SIEMENS WSL Project Duration:
Date:
The present summary report is related to the project called « ERTMS - EUROSIG », carried out in the frame of the 4th Framework R&D Programme of the EC, according to the contract referenced RA - 95 - SC.103. This project is part of an overall high level project (ERTMS = European Railway Traffic Management System) aiming at developing a new control command system for railways, with the final purpose of ensuring interoperability of European trains throughout the European railway network. The contract was agreed between the EC and nine industrial companies active in the railway signalling field (the so-called EUROSIG consortium). The present project was initially due to start on 1/1/96 and to terminate on 31/8/97 ; an amendment to the contract was agreed between all parties, extending the duration of the project up to 31/3/98. The project was executed by the industrial partners, one of them acting as co-ordinator on project level. The work to be performed has been shared between the partners through a subdivision in workpackages (WP), each WP being allocated to some partners with one of them acting as WP leader (WPL). 1.2 Specific contribution of the ERTMS EUROSIG project to the overall ERTMS project The overall ERTMS project was progressively started during the early nineties. At the beginning of the 4th Framework Programme, i.e. in 1995, the EC defined a global strategy for the further development of ERTMS with the aim to prepare its future implementation on the European railway network : this global strategy, described in the "Master Plan of Activities", included :
- a validation phase, whose objective is to perform full - scale tests on test sites located in different countries. The present ERTMS EUROSIG project was a contribution to the development phase, with the following main aims : elaboration of an overall system architecture concept; specification of all interfaces to be standardised for interoperability; specification and development of the test tools needed for the first step of the validation phase. The partners of the contract are the following nine companies (list and names of companies as in the contract after amendment) :
- ABB Signal Aktiebolog (''ABB'') : partner - GEC ALSTHOM ACEC Transport S.A. (''ACEC Transport'') : partner - Alcatel Sel AG (''Alcatel'') : partner - Ansaldo Trasporti S.p.A. (''ATR'') : partner - Sasib Railway S.p.A. (''Sasib'') : partner - CSEE Transport (''CTR'') : partner - SIEMENS AG Transportation System (''SIEMENS'') : partner - WESTINGHOUSE Signals Limited (''WSL'') : partner The current names and addresses of the companies are given in section 8. The objectives of the project are reminded hereafter. They take into account the objectives as defined in the original contract, their formal evolution through the amendment and, when relevant, their clarification through the partial results of the work in progress and through the external contacts with other ERTMS related projects. 3.1 Objectives related to system activities The main objectives related to system activities were : - to contribute to the ERTMS architecture definition ; 3.2 Objectives related to the interfaces specifications The objectives related to the interface specifications were to extend and consolidate the following interface specifications partially outlined during previous contracts in the frame of the 3rd Framework R&D Programme : - FIS and FFFIS for EUROBALISE, i.e. more precisely :
- FIS and FFFIS for EUROCAB, i.e. more precisely :
- FIS and FFFIS for EURORADIO, related to both interfaces :
According to the amendment, all objectives related to EUROLOOP interfaces were cancelled. 3.3 Objectives related to tests and test tools specifications The objectives were to elaborate tests and test tools specifications for the tests to be carried out in the frame of the EMSET project, which includes : - sub-system tests, related to EUROBALISE and EURORADIO, on both aspects of : A strong co-operation with the EMSET project was an implicit objective as well, in order to ensure full consistency between the specifications issued by the present project and the test plan and test procedures to be produced by EMSET. 3.4 Objectives related to test tools development The objectives were to develop test tools according to the specifications defined hereabove, i.e. to produce a first sample of tools and the documentation allowing reproduction. For budgetary reasons, the development of system tools included in the present original contract was limited to the complementary test tools for laboratory tests (while the development of the test tools for site tests was supposed to be taken in charge by the EMSET project). According to the amendment, the complete development of system tools has been cancelled from this project, this part of activity having to be incorporated in EMSET. The activities started according to the contract at the beginning of 1996. A progressively increased delay was induced in most activities, due to two main external reasons :
- during the second year, the necessity of a very strong co-ordination with other ERTMS related projects, especially EMSET, also induced some additional delay. 4.1 Activities related to the system The system related activities were supposed to last until August 1996. In fact, the main input document has been expected from EEIG until August 1996 (SRS version 2), and new versions were made available in December 1996 (version 3) and in July 1997 (version 4a). Therefore, rather than being a standalone activity based on stable inputs, the system related activities rather consisted in co-operation work with EEIG on the ERTMS requirements specification work. 4.2 Activities related to the interface specifications The activities on interface specifications were supposed to be a simple completion of the work done in the frame of the previous EUROBALISE, EUROCAB and EURORADIO contracts, and to be ready at the middle of 1996. In fact the uncertainties on functional requirements made it difficult to start before the second quarter of 1996, and most workpackages were officially closed only after the first quarter of 1997. Moreover, later modifications of some FFFIS were still necessary afterwards, e.g. due to the envisaged shift of the telepowering frequency for EUROBALISE. 4.3 Activities related to tests and test tools specifications The activities on tests and tools specifications were supposed, according to the original contract, to start in May 1996 and to last until January 1997 for specifications on sub-system level (EUROBALISE and EURORADIO), and until October 1996 for specifications on system level (EUROCAB). The activities related to EUROBALISE and EURORADIO started at the middle of 1996, and were pursued till the end of 1997, the scope having been adapted to take into account the definition made in the mean time of the sub-system tests to be performed in the EMSET project. The activities related to EUROCAB tests and test tools could not really start as long as a minimum information was not available on the scope of the EMSET system tests ; this minimum information was the content of the EMSET test plan and the EEIG test requirement specification which became available at the end of 1996. The activities started therefore at the end of 1996, the first half of 1997 being mainly devoted to define in strong co-operation with EMSET the test configurations for laboratory and site. The tools specification work, mainly for the tools to be subcontracted to ERRI, was done from July 1997 till March 1998. 4.4 Activities related to test tools development The tools development, initially supposed to be started during the 4th quarter of 1996, was delayed till the tools specifications were in a sufficiently stabilised form. In the mean time :
- it was decided to disclose the development of each individual sub-system related tool to one single company, and it was therefore necessary to agree the sharing of all tools between all companies, balancing in an acceptable way the development work of both this project and the EMSET one. The development work for EUROBALISE and EURORADIO tools started therefore at the beginning of the 4th quarter of 1997 for common activities, and in most companies at the very end of 1997 for the individual work of development of the tool(s) assigned to them. 5.1 Summary of the results and conclusions Referring to the specific contribution expected from the ERTMS EUROSIG project to the overall ERTMS project, as defined in section 1.2., the contribution of the present project to the ERTMS development plan may be regarded as fully satisfactory. Thanks to the results of this project and to the results of the other ERTMS related projects of the 4th Framework R&D Programme, the development phase of ERTMS as defined in section 1.2 is now nearly ready, and the ERTMS project may enter into its validation phase. 5.2 Results and conclusions of the system activities The system activities of this project were consolidated by EEIG, contributing to the issuing of regularly update system requirement specifications. The process of upgrading the system requirement specifications is expected to go on during the next few years, due to the feed-back of the experience which will be gained during the validation phase in the frame of the various test bases. 5.3 Results and conclusions related to interface specifications The work was concentrated on the specifications of all interfaces involved in the future guarantee of interoperability. The resulting interface specifications are very complete and detailed, and may globally be expected to remain stable in the future ; as a matter of fact, their stability is highly desirable, since significant changes could jeopardise the complete ERTMS project. Evolution of the system requirements on upper level or feedback of problems encountered on the test bases are probably the only possible reasons for later evolution of the interface specifications, which should hopefully be limited to detail changes. The interface specifications related to EUROBALISE are particularly reliable, thanks to the fact that it has been possible to verify critical technical issues against the on-going EUROBALISE development work and to obtain very good common understanding of the requirements through discussions with the Railway's experts. Regarding EURORADIO, the FIS specifies a complete functional reference architecture for the EURORADIO sub-system. The EURORADIO FFFIS gives a suitable and flexible definition of an EURORADIO interfacing to the I/O parts of the communication channel between train and ground, taking into consideration the best devices / solutions existing on the market. The EURORADIO FFFIS produced in the scope of this contract has been used by MORANE as a basis for the mandatory GSM-R FFFIS. Regarding EUROCAB, the definition of the FFFIS for external STM (i.e. not "integrated" in the ERTMS black box), is largely complete. A few points have still to be dealt with, especially in relation with the late agreement on Profibus, and will be defined outside the scope of this contract. 5.4 Results and conclusions related to sub-system tests and test tools specifications A very large set of documents is available, for EUROBALISE as well as for EURORADIO, in a version which may be regarded as final in view of the current knowledge on the interoperability requirements : they define a set of tests and the tools suitable for performing these tests. In the future, the tests specifications - and therefore the tools specifications - will probably have to be :
5.5 Results and conclusions related to system test tools specifications A set of tools specifications for the laboratory EMSET system tests has been produced; this result, however, achieved in the present ERMTS EUROSIG contract, cannot be considered as standing alone because some activity has to be performed in the EMSET R&D contract for reaching consolidated results. The specifications and the tools could therefore be subject to further amendment as part of the EMSET R&D contract. 5.6 Results and conclusions related to sub-system test tools development As a joint result of both the present project and the EMSET R&D one, and thanks to the sharing of the development work amongst the companies, a sample of each tool is available at the date of this report in the premises of the company in charge of it. This result, however, has to be consolidated in the EMSET project, which will include the following tasks :
- subsequent finalisation of the design documentation ; - definition of the tools configuration for performing the EMSET laboratory sub-system tests. On the short term, the on-going development by the companies of industrial products and sub-systems conform to ERTMS specifications is made easier thanks to the collaboration with railways through the various test projects supported by the EC, such as EMSET, ETCSVB and the pilot projects in France, Germany and Italy. The medium term objective of each one of the partners of this contract is to be able to tender for the future projects aiming to implement ERTMS on European lines and rolling stock, as well as outside Europe : the different signalling companies will therefore be in a competitive position, however on the basis of commonly agreed functional, interface and test specifications. Collaboration between partners of this contract in the frame of future commercial projects would take place only on the basis of case by case bilateral agreements. 7. EXPLOITATION AND DISSEMINATION PLANS The interface specifications will be the basis for the development of components to be included in ERTMS systems, the first applications being the test bases in Spain, France, Germany and Italy, the future test bases in Holland and United Kingdom, and also commercial projects e.g. in Germany and Switzerland. The EUROBALISE, EURORADIO and EUROCAB FFFIS will also be used as the base for the works on standardisation in the CENELEC working groups SC9XA / WGA9B, WGA9C and WGA9E. The work performed on sub-system tests (tests specifications, test tools specifications and test tools development) will in first instance be exploited in the individual companies for reproduction of the tools and in EMSET for performing the sub-system tests. Later on, this work will hopefully be a basis for the future national notified bodies in charge of interoperability certification. Since the tools specifications and the tools design documentation will remain the common property of EUROSIG companies, suitable commercial arrangements will have to be reached. The work performed on system tools (test tools specifications) jointly with the work performed in the EMSET project (tests specifications, test tools development) will first allow to perform the EMSET system tests themselves. Later on it will be possible to take advantage of this work in the frame of other test campaigns, e.g. in other ERTMS test bases. Modification of the tools, as well as adaptation and expansion of the tools configurations will be technically possible, thanks to the modular conception, but will again have to be commercially negotiated, taking into account the memorandum of understanding between companies of the EMSET consortium, which regulates this matter. 8. NAMES AND ADDRESSES OF THE CO-ORDINATOR AND ALL PARTNERS The current name and address of the co-ordinator is : The current names and addresses of the partners (in the same order as in section 2) are : |
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Last Updated: 26-07-1999 |
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