The survey of 321 rail experts, conducted by the Railway Industry Association (RIA), revealed that 62 per cent of respondents in 2021 believed rail is ‘extremely, very or quite innovative’, a 12 per cent increase from 2019.
For the current five-yearly funding cycle, Network Rail has allocated £245m for research and development projects.
The money is being spent on various efforts including digitising the railways as demand for services continues to rise, creating algorithms to improve safety and “intelligent” infrastructure that can detect problems with passing trains.
But while the survey showed that confidence in rail innovation is on the rise, the sector was seen as less innovative than the automotive, transport, finance and defence sectors, even though it had seen the largest swing of those sectors from 2019 to 2021.
Availability of rail funding, testing and trialling facilities and innovation advice were listed as the three ‘facilities and resources...