It’s a rather special train that left Liège Guillemins station on Monday morning. On board, no passengers (except a few officials and journalists), but a battery of computer equipment, sensors and screens of all kinds responsible for examining the network of this portion of the Walloon backbone. This is the final stage of a project started three years earlier.
During the night from Saturday to Sunday, the Infrabel teams commissioned the ETCS system on the Liège-Namur line. Now, some 3,333 kilometers of track are equipped with this safety device, i.e. 52% of the network. “A feat that places us in the top of Europe. Belgium is at the top of the ranking!”, rejoices Benoit Gilson, CEO of Infrabel. Only Luxembourg does better, with 100% of its network already converted. Belgium aims for full coverage by 2025.
For the traveler, ETCS does not mean much. This English acronym (European Train Control Systemor European Train Control System) refers to the device that ensures the safety of the rail network by collecting data from the infrastructure and transmitting it to the trains.
Thus, when a locomotive travels on a portion equipped with ETCS limited to forty kilometers per hour, its counter is blocked at this speed.
A kind of ‘cruise control’
The control also applies to traffic lights. When approaching a red light, the train driver receives the signal well before the light device and the speed of the train is adapted upstream. If the driver does not slow down, the machine takes over and automatically changes the speed so as to avoid crossing the red light.
For this, it was necessary to equip hundreds of kilometers of infrastructure to allow the exchange of information. The figures for the installation of the system clearly show the magnitude of the task. On this single portion of the Walloon ridge of 122 kilometers, there are 1,400 small beacons placed on the ground. It was also necessary to install around forty boxes for computer equipment, and set up forty GSM-R antennas (Infrabel is working on its own network).
“It’s a kind of adaptive ‘cruise control’, as we know it for cars. According to the data transferred by the infrastructure, the train automatically adapts its speed”, explains Frédéric Sacré, spokesperson for Infrabel. A way, above all, to compensate for human errors. Each year, Infrabel records between 50 and 100 red light crossings. However, not all present the same degree of risk. A dozen of these offenses present a real danger of accidents.
Belgium has caught up
The start of the implementation of this safety system dates back to 2013, three years after the collision between two trains in Buizingen, which claimed the lives of 19 people and injured 125 others. The commission of inquiry concluded that Belgian rail is not secure enough. Belgium then had to catch up. “At the time, only the driver had the possibility of stopping the train by activating the brake. We then put in place another system but clearly ETCS is what we do best”, assures Benoit Gilson. An accident such as that which occurred in Greece on February 28, where 57 people perished, could not happen.
For the driver, this system greatly enhances safetyassures Maximilien, train driver at Infrabel for ten years. We feel accompanied, and therefore we are more at ease. ETCS minimizes the risk of driver error. This is clearly positive for drivers.”
The ETCS system is also standardized at European level. This means that trains could run without interruption across the European area when the whole rail network is liberalised. Provided that all countries have reached the same level of equipment, which is still far from being the case.