A considerable portion (43%) of global travel and tourism construction projects, including railways, are currently in execution stage, indicating a strong focus on advancing infrastructure, driven by advancements in connectivity, cloud, and 5G.
Governments are increasingly investing in upgrading railway infrastructure, with projects focusing on constructing new tracks, signalling systems, and electrical equipment. Such investments improve the efficiency of existing services, open new revenue streams, and attract more passengers. With these developments comes a growing emphasis on sustainable rail solutions which aim to create greener high-speed rail networks.
As countries worldwide enhance their rail infrastructure, integrating smart technologies will play a crucial role in improving efficiency and passenger experience. The benefits of upgraded railway infrastructure are numerous, ranging from enhanced safety and real-time tracking through the implementation of solutions such as Automatic Train Protection (ATP) and Train Management Systems (TMS) to a more centralised connectivity system that integrates multiple onboard systems, such as GPS, passenger information, and security solutions.
This integration reduces operational complexity and maintenance costs associated with managing separate systems. Rail operators are increasingly adopting these solutions to streamline operations, improve predictive maintenance, and enhance customer service by consolidating operations into single platforms.
Finding the right technology
“Transportation is a very important infrastructure for each country and the key foundation of economic and social development,” says Jacky Wang, Vice President of Smart Transportation BU, Huawei. “Many countries across South Africa, the Middle East, and Asia Pacific have already launched intelligent transportation strategies, including regional transportation and logistics centres and the latest digital technology will help them build safer, greener, more efficient, more enjoyable, and more cost-effective transportation and ultimately achieve mobility as a service. As the efficiency of transportation improves business will boom, particularly in areas like logistics, tourism, and international trade.”
“To achieve digital transformation, intelligence, and economisation, we must find the right technology for different scenarios.”
Future Railway Mobile Communication Systems (FRMCS), for example, will play a crucial role in the digital transformation of railways. Designed as the successor of GSM-R by the International Union of Railways (UIC) in close cooperation with stakeholders across the rail sector, FRMCS is a key enabler of rail digitalisation. It has three strata — application, service, and transport, each of which is decoupled from one another. This architecture supports further railway applications, such as visualised management, predictive maintenance, intrusion alarm, precise positioning, digital map, and disaster warning. It also allows railway operators to choose 4G, 5G, or other radio access technologies (RATs) for data transmission based on their service requirements, and service and ecosystem maturity.
Launched at InnoTrans 2024, Huawei’s whitepaper Railway Wireless for FRMCS discusses in detail network deployment solutions for FRMCS, drawing on its technical expertise in the wireless field to serve as a technical reference for the planning and construction of the next-generation railway wireless network. It specifies the major challenges that railway customers face during mobile communications upgrades, interprets the latest FRMCS standards, and highlights the advantages of FRMCS over traditional narrowband systems.
Sheng Fu, Huawei’s Director of Transportation Industry Solution, Enterprise Wireless Marketing & Solution Sales Dept, recently stated that Huawei has proposed 5G-oriented solutions to help railway customers smoothly upgrade their wireless communications systems and drive their digital and intelligent transformation. In line with the latest FRMCS standards released by UIC, these solutions will leverage next-generation railway wireless communications networks with high bandwidth and low latency, while considering key factors like customer requirements, technical evolution, ecosystem, and costs.
Next-generation solutions
Further highlighting its focus on key challenges and opportunities in the digital upgrade of railways and the evolution of wireless mobile communications technology, Huawei used this year’s InnoTrans event to also launch its next-generation optical communication bearer network solution based on the MS-OTN platform.
The industry’s first railway optical communication network solution that supports the fine-grain OTN (fgOTN) standard, Huawei’s solution aims to ensure secure and stable running in the railway industry. It offers unified access to various services such as E1, PDH, SDH, MPLS-TP, and fgOTN and provides high bandwidth, high reliability, low latency, and easy O&M to meet current railway service requirements. It also enables the smooth evolution of the railway wireless train control system from GSM-R to FRMCS.
As railways develop, they increasingly require higher bandwidth and more flexible cross-connect granularities to carry various services and meet the requirements of future-oriented production communication networks.
According to Huawei: “fgOTN is clearly defined as the next-generation technology to replace SDH. Alongside SDH [Synchronous Digital Hierarchy], it is another technology that has international standards to support constant bit rate (CBR) service bearing.
“With the same fixed timeslot and mapping advantages as SDH, fgOTN also provides physical isolation to ensure service security and reliability, achieving SDH-like stable and low latency performance.”
Compared with conventional SDH devices, the MS-OTN platform that supports the fgOTN standard provides the same bandwidth as OTN on the line side, which is more than tenfold that of SDH. fgOTN also supports the transmission of smaller-granularity services and can offer more services of various types, all while achieving efficient transmission and flexible scheduling.
Other benefits include enhanced O&M capability, more efficient clock synchronisation, and the ability to meet bandwidth growth requirements over the next 10 to 15 years.
In the spirit of looking ahead, Huawei’s digital-first 5G-orientated solutions will set the standards in railway system advancement. The adoption of next generation advanced standards such as wireless networks and optical wired networks, such as fgOTN, is proving crucial to meeting the growing demands of an increasingly connected world while ensuring sustainable development. These new standards will facilitate the creation of the next-generation railway communication network, and Huawei will play a crucial role in that growth, fully leveraging optical technologies to build a solid foundation for transportation and accelerating the digital upgrade of the railway industry.
Download Huawei’s new whitepaper here.
