The IET 2016 International Conference on Railway Engineering (ICRE) was held recently in Brussels on 12-13 May. The conference has previously been organised every three years by the Hong Kong Railway Transport Section and aims to provide a forum for sharing knowledge and experience, promoting collaboration among practitioners, and reporting applications of new technologies in railway engineering. The 2016 event was the first time the Railway Network have held ICRE in Europe and centred on the theme of “Enhancing Railway Operations”. The event demonstrated that innovation is happening within the global rail community, using currently available technology to achieve the previously unachievable. 10 key points from ICRE 2016
- Attended by international industry professionals from academic/commercial backgrounds
- First time IET ICRE has been held in Europe
- Key themes:
- Safety
- Infrastructure and Systems
- ICT and Data
- Optimisation and Performance
- Railway Condition Monitoring
- All the talks had a focus on digital railway topics, and how modelling and data can enhance railway operations and design
- The talks also provided a timeline of how data, information and computational power can enhance rail operations by allowing engineers to better understand assets past usage, assess their current usage and model how future usage can affect the whole railway system.
- Talks all focused on what can be done next to ensure progress is maintained
- There was a clear impression, given by the talks, that data and modelling will provide firm foundations for the development of good asset management practice within the Rail Industry.
- By being smarter with commercial contracts and ensuring correct legal frameworks are in place, a cross industry use of Remote Condition Monitoring can be achieved, ensuring that future data can be captured in a standardised format.
In my opinion, and those whom I managed to talk to throughout the conference, the event was a success. The way in which the conference was broken down into sessions allowed for question and answer sections to be more of an open communication than most conferences. The audience were fully engaged from start to finish, thanks to the variety of speakers topics and the high quality of presentations given. It was a pleasure to have attended the event and I, as well as others, am excited to see how the work presented at the conference will develop change in Rail Industry.Special thanks must be given to Deborah-Claire McKenzie, Li-Anne Nixon and the IET.tv team for organising, co-ordinating and filming the event.
Comment from Chris Marshman, Conference joint Chairman
“I personally found the conference to be very stimulating and the task of chairing the first day was most enjoyable. It will be excellent if we can see some of the research carried out exploited in a timely manner. I trust the IET will continue to support the event both in Hong Kong 2017 and in 2018 onwards and enable this conference to grow and be fruitful for the railway community and for the prestige of the IET as an Institution. I look forward to seeing the IET TV videos and recommend these to those who were unable to attend the conference.”
Comment from John Easton, Conference joint Chairman
"Given the existing expertise of its members it’s no surprise that the IET is well-placed to provide clear guidance to the industry in this area, and for me one of the take-home messages from the conference floor was that the IET can provide support to the railways by acting as both a watchtower for breakthrough technologies, and as a conduit for best practice from its regional networks around the globe."
Click here to view our highlights video and all the presentations from the conference.
A full review of the event can be found here together with some images.
Blog prepared by Martin Halligan, Railway Network Volunteer