The railway sector is currently acting in a fragmented way and in silos, corresponding most often to physical or functional subsystems or use cases, and the different owners/managers of the overall infrastructure at regional/national level, without global extensive view or full control of the global system involved by rail operations. With the progress of digitization, analogue devices based on relays were progressively substituted by digital ones, and it is more and more evident that enabling the communication between already existing digital tools for various subsystems can be beneficial. What is missing is an efficient, automated and standardized way for these integrated and interplaying systems to act as one ecosystem: sharing, integrating, identifying, correlating and exploiting the right data at the right time. In order to meet these challenges, the objective of LinX4Rail is to develop and promote within Shift2Rail framework and beyond, a sectorial common Functional Railway System Architecture. It will be supported by a widely adopted Shift2Rail Conceptual Data Model (CDM) that will, with the commitment of the Shift2Rail members, through Shift2Rail Programme Board Change Management Process, establish the standard for interactions between legacy and new systems and thus ensure sustainable interoperability between systems. The ambition of LinX4Rail is to achieve a comprehensive approach for the CDM, global system modelling specification and a strategy for implementation of technological breakthroughs, including RCA, with the inputs from a communication system perspective and give a vision of future evolution of Functional Railway System Architecture.

IN2RAIL is to set the foundations for a resilient, consistent, cost-efficient, high capacity European network by delivering important building blocks that unlock the innovation potential that exists in SHIFT2RAIL: innovative technologies will be explored and resulting concepts embedded in a systems framework where infrastructure, information management, maintenance techniques, energy, and engineering are integrated, optimised, shared and exploited. IN2RAIL will make advances towards SHIFT2RAIL objectives: enhancing the existing capacity fulfilling user demand; increasing the reliability delivering better and consistent quality of service; reducing the LCC increasing competitiveness of the EU rail system. To achieve the above, a holistic approach covering Smart Infrastructures, Intelligent Mobility Management (I2M)and Rail Power Supply and Energy Management will be applied. Smart Infrastructure addresses the fundamental design of critical assets - switches and crossings and tracks. It will research components capable of meeting future railway demands and will utilise modern technologies in the process. Risk and condition-based LEAN approaches to optimise RAMS and LCC in asset maintenance activities will be created to tackle the root causes of degradation. I2M researches automated, interoperable and inter-connected advanced traffic management systems; scalable and upgradable systems, utilising standardised products and interfaces, enabling easy migration from legacy systems; the wealth of data and information on assets and traffic status; information management systems adding the capability of nowcasting and forecasting of critical asset statuses. Rail Power Supply and Energy Management create solutions to improve the energy performance of the railway system. Research on new power systems characterised by reduced losses and capable of balancing energy demands, along with innovative energy management systems enabling accurate and precise estimates of energy flows.

The high-level objective of TAURO is to identify, analyse and finally propose suitable founding technologies for the future European automated and autonomous rail transport, to be further developed, certified and deployed through the activities planned for the European Partnership for Transforming Europe’s Rail System. To achieve this, TAURO is divided into four technical WPs, following the scope of the call, that each deal with separate system elements, with each contributing to the overall goal of the project. These four areas of work are; • Environment perception for automation • Remote driving and command • Automatic status monitoring and diagnostic for autonomous trains • Technologies supporting migration to ATO over ETCS These technical WPs will be supported by a comprehensive dissemination and exploitation WP that will guarantee the results from TAURO are communicated to the necessary stakeholders, standards and regulatory bodies to ensure that the future policy and technical decisions are taken on the basis of the science and research performed in TAURO, and more important, who guarantee the coherence with other Shift2Rail ongoing activities and assure a seamless bridging between TAURO and the next initiative within Horizon Europe, Transforming Europe’s Rail System.

X2Rail-1 addresses the S2R-CFM-IP2-01-2015 “Start-up activities for Advanced Signalling and Automation System” call issued by the Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking as part of the Innovation Programme 2 “Advanced Traffic Management & Control Systems”. The X2Rail-1 project aims to research and develop six selected key technologies to foster innovations in the field of railway signalling and automation systems towards a flexible, real-time, intelligent traffic management and decision support system. The actions to be undertaken in the scope of X2Rail-1 are related to the following specific objectives: To overcome the limitations of the existing communication systems by adapting radio communication systems which establish the backbone for the next generation advanced rail automation systems. To improve the usable track capacity by introducing more Automatic Train Operation (ATO) systems and Moving Block systems. To innovate the signalling architectures towards more decentralized and less cost intensive systems by incorporating Moving Block systems and Smart Wayside Objects. To minimize energy consumption and to improve train punctuality through more extensive use of Automatic Train Operation (ATO) systems. To increase innovation in the field of lab testing by developing architectures for new lab test systems and simulations for control, command and communication systems in order to reduce costs. To ensure security among all connected signalling and control systems by developing new cyber security systems dedicated to railways. To ensure the backward compatibility of ERMTS/ETCS technologies, notwithstanding of the required functional enrichment of the future signalling and control systems.