EC Issues Progress Report, Review Plans on Rail Safety, Interoperability

September 9, 2009 // Published as a news service by IHS

At the same time, the EC announced publication of a progress report on the implementation of rail safety and interoperability directives in the European Union (EU).

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The conference was convened in the aftermath of the June 29 accident in Viareggio, Italy, when a freight train derailed and a wagon exploded, causing 28 fatalities.

Review of Rail Safety Rules and Practices
Current EU rail transport practice shares the use of the same railway infrastructure for freight and passenger services, for both practical and economic reasons. However, the EC holds that mixed traffic needs to be managed in the safest possible way, and infrastructure and rolling stock must be properly maintained.

Accordingly, the EC has been working to maintain and improve railway safety standards through the development and implementation of safety regulations and technical requirements.

In the wake of the Viareggio tragedy, the EC said it is appropriate to review existing rail safety rules and practices, as well as the quality of their implementation, and to consider opportunities for improvement.

The conference program included all aspects of railway safety in these major areas:

• Safety at the level of infrastructures and operations.
• Safety at the level of vehicles.
• Safety at the level of goods transported.
• Supervision and investigation.

EC vice president Antonio Tajani, responsible for transport, said, "I am personally convinced that we could further improve our safety levels by introducing two important elements. Firstly we should move towards a system that also includes distance-based controls for train wagons. Secondly we need to strengthen the powers of the European Railway Agency by allowing it for instance to take part in national investigations of accidents."

Conference attendees included representatives of EU member states governments, national safety authorities, national investigation bodies, the railway industry, the European Railway Agency and the EC.

Progress Report of Rail Safety and Interoperability
The EU's rail safety and interoperability directives, together with legislation on market access, form the legal framework for an integrated European Railway Area.

According to the EC's Sept. 8 progress report in this area, the EC said it was satisfied with the quality of harmonization of technical requirements, but found that the implementation speed of harmonized rules is still slow. This is partly due to the long life cycle of some parts of the rail systems, such as infrastructure and rolling stock.

The report described progress in implementing the Railway Safety Directive and in achieving interoperability of the European rail system since the first report adopted by the EC in November 2006 (Communication from the Commission to the Council and European Parliament: Progress Report on the implementation of the interoperability directives, COM(2006) 660 final).

The report stated that the progress in railway safety and interoperability made possible by the EU regulatory framework has promoted, in turn, a further development of the internal rail market, helping new businesses to establish themselves, cutting entry costs and, ultimately, promoting the competitiveness of rail vis-a-vis other modes of transport.

The report pointed out that statistics indicate the EU railway system is very safe. The organizational changes introduced under EU law had no negative impact on safety; on the contrary, they are expected to raise safety levels in the both the short term and medium term.

From a market perspective, country-specific safety requirements still impose significant entry barriers. These relate mainly to the cost and the duration of the homologation procedures involved at the national level, their disparity across Europe and their lack of transparency or predictability.

Substantial progress in this field is expected, stemming on one hand from the harmonization of safety certificates for railway undertakings and the introduction of common safety methods and, on the other hand, from the amended interoperability directive, which will now impose cross-acceptance of national rules when authorizing the placing into service of rail vehicles.

EC implementing legislation on interoperability (the so-called technical specifications for interoperability, or TSIs) is expected to be completed in 2010 as far as the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) is concerned. The increasing number of interoperable infrastructures and rolling stock plus the limited number of derogations requested by EU member states indicate that, overall, the existing TSIs are being successfully implemented.

Progress towards interoperability is a slow process. Because of the long lifetime of rail infrastructure and rolling stock and the need to keep investment costs for the sector at an acceptable level, radical changes towards harmonized solutions are not possible. This is why the EC intends to concentrate efforts on implementing those technical specifications that will deliver significant benefits in the short and medium term, such as telematics applications in signaling, freight and passenger transport.

"The European Railway Agency and the National Safety Authorities have only been established a few years ago, but they have already proved to be instrumental in building an integrated European Railway Area. It is my intention to strengthen the role of the agency even further," said Tajani.

Further Information
For more information, see the press release on Background on railway safety (MEMO/09/377) and the EC's 2007 study analyzing the degree of implementation of rail interoperability and safety legislation and progress.

Source: European Commission (EC).