ERRAC releases Strategic Research & Innovation Agenda, defining new rail sector priorities

2020 has been a year of crisis. Europe, and the world, have endured two waves of a pandemic and rolling examples of the intensifying ramifications of climate change. When plotting solutions to both challenges, rail is clearly a solution.

As Europe’s cleanest, safest and most reliable form of mass transportation, our sector has demonstrated its value moving goods and personnel as needed for effective crisis management and as a potential backbone for a sustainable multimodal mobility paradigm aligned with EU Green Deal objectives. ERRAC's new Strategic Research & Innovation Agenda describes 9 research & innovation 'Transforming Projects' required to maximise Europe’s railways’ contribution to meeting emerging mobility needs, strengthening green freight, exploring new solutions such as automation, digital twins and smart asset management.

This document, produced on the sector’s behalf by the European Rail Research Advisory Council (ERRAC), establishes a new research and innovation agenda that can transform rail’s contribution to European mobility, addressing the needs of users, the economy and society while contributing to the recovery of rail transport from the COVID-19 crisis and protecting natural resources and the environment.

Speaking on the importance of continued innovation, Alberto Parrondo, ERRAC Chair and Thales Vice-President, stated: “Rail has demonstrated it can satisfy the mobility needs of goods and passengers, can accommodate capacity growth and can deliver large transformation programmes. The sector is rich in ideas to make effective use of technology and innovation.”

Read the full Strategic Research Innovation Agenda here.