Increasing freight transport speed has also imposed the technical adaptation of wagons so as to cope with speeds of up to 160 km/h. Therefore, for the Inter Cargo Express freight service, German railway operator DB has bought DRSS-bogie container wagons for maximum speeds of 160 km/h as early as 1991. Germany’s initiative in terms of [...]
The constant increase of speeds for passenger trains has imposed the improvement of their braking systems in order to ensure the safety of traffic and shorter braking distances. Apart from the automated pneumatic brake with direct acting, the basic braking system of any train, it was necessary to introduce additional braking systems. As we all [...]
Since the opening of the first HS lines in Europe, there has been an impressive progress in all fields of railways, whose most noticeable evidence -and benefit- is the progressive enhancement of commercial speed. These advancements have implied an increase in requirements’ exigency of not only track components but also in the associated civil works [...]
The winter is one of the most demanding seasons for railway operators. Snow, ice and storms can affect the whole operation of the railway network. In order to get prepared for severe weather phenomema, the Austrian Federal Railroads (ÖBB) introduced a weather forecast alert system, called infra:wetter (infrastructure weather), in 2005. With this system in [...]
This year, the months of June, July and August have been characterised by excessively high temperatures and lack of humidity on the entire territory of Romania and in a large part of Europe. In this period, the persons who travelled by passenger trains on the CFR line network had unpleasant surprises during the day, with [...]
Track circuits are railway safety installations, with an automatic and permanent operation, their basic function is to inform about the “free” or “busy” state of the insulated railway sections. This function is based on the fact that the wheels – axle assemblies of the stationary or moving rolling stock have a very low ohmic resistance [...]
Erex differs from any other railway energy settlement system in several ways. For both railway infrastructure managers, train operators and the railway industry there are obvious advantages.Erex offers a unique opportunity for railway infrastructure managers to the lead instead of following the technological advancement. Together saving railway energy in Europe With Erex railways do not [...]
Over the past 10 years railway operators around the world have migrated their mobile communications infrastructure to GSM-R. As mobile communications continue to evolve, many of these operators are now looking to upgrade their networks from legacy Time Division Multiplex (TDM) technology to a next-generation packet based architecture. As the world’s leading provider of GSM-R [...]
Technology S-CURVE It is over 10,000 years since the wheel was originally invented. Since then, after a very long period of ‘early exploration’, we have seen many technological breakthroughs in transport, especially in public transport. Today, our industry has a wide and colourful palette of tools to perform its tasks. However, we already reached the [...]
High-speed trains are well developing around the world due to their numerous advantages. Indeed, they are safe, sustainable, energy efficient, convenient and comfortable for passengers. Amongst the few drawbacks of such trains is the current collection mechanism, generally implementedas a pantograph in mechanical and electrical contact with the overhead line equipment, the catenary. The Pantograph-Catenary [...]
