Abstract
Railway signalling research- how the past made the present. The current state of the art in railway signalling and train control systems, including computerised interlocking systems, automatic train control and protection systems such as the European Train Control System (ETCS), is built on foundations which were laid in the 1970s and 1980s. The British Rail Research & Development Division in Derby played a prominent role in the development of these technologies. Using brief case studies of a number of significant research projects with which the author of was closely involved this presentation will show the work of the past has built the railway world of the present, including a personal view of why some projects thrived and why some did not.The privatisation and fragmentation of British Rail in the 1990s left a void in railway research which is only now starting to be filled, and the author will offer his thoughts on which lessons of the past offer the greatest hope for the future. British Rail research and development in the 1970s and 1980s laid the foundations of today's railway signalling and train control systems, including computerised interlocking systems, automatic train control and protection systems such as ETCS and Transmission Based Signalling, and automatic routing and regulating of train movements. The privatisation and fragmentation of British Rail in the 1990s left a void in railway research which is only now starting to be filled. The two papers at this event will describe the contribution of past research to the current state of the art and show how research is now reviving.
