A collaboration between Wabtec and partners demonstrated Automated Shunting Operations (ASO) at Vienna’s Albern Hafen rail yard earlier this month. ASO should help improve productivity, mitigate staff shortages and improve operational safety. The technology will now proceed to pilot operations before commercial deployment.
The demonstration took place under the framework of Europe’s Rail’s FP5 TRANS4M-R project, which aims to improve rail freight by enabling higher transport and shorter transportation times, improve flexibility and reliability, and deal with staff shortages.
ASO falls under this framework. It is designed to automate the formation and handling of trains within rail yards. In simple terms, ASO enables a locomotive to autonomously assemble trains and perform shunting operations. The locomotive receives digital instructions, which it carries out automatically while integrated with the yard’s operational and safety systems.
In Vienna, a demonstrator successfully showcased this concept. It integrated a GoA4 Yard Management System, automated route planning and setting, remotely controlled switches, equipped wagons, and an automated battery-powered shunting locomotive. The locomotive was capable of executing missions without human intervention.
A variety of benefits
Wabtec’s EMEA Sales Director Costel Antonello Grozea called the demonstrator “a great success”. The system performed reliably throughout the demonstrations and validated key automated train-formation and wagon-handling processes in a real operational environment, according to him.
ASO will provide numerous benefits to rail freight, Antonello Grozea tells RailFreight.com. For one, it can improve safety by reducing workers’ exposure to moving rolling stock and coupling operations in rail yards. It can also reduce the need for already scarce operational staff.
Moreover, ASO has the potential to grow the productivity of rail yards and their throughput: trains can be formed faster, more predictably and punctually. Lastly, the technology could increase operational resilience by standardising the execution of shunting tasks.
However, says Antonello Grozea, the real benefits come to fruition when all of the above is taken together. “In many cases, operators can handle more traffic, with greater consistency and lower risk, without the need for major infrastructure expansion.”
Progressive implementation
Naturally, such a technology does not come for free. Wabtec’s EMEA Sales Director refrains from naming specific cost forecasts for ASO implementation. The answer to the cost question, the company says, “depends on the operator’s starting point and the level of automation they wish to achieve.” For example, ASO could work together with the Digital Automatic Coupler (DAC), or be integrated with existing traffic and yard management, as well as interlocking.
“One of the key lessons learned during the Vienna demonstrations is that automation can be introduced progressively, allowing operators to build a roadmap aligned with their operational priorities and investment cycles”, Antonello Grozea says.
The Vienna demonstrator indicates that ASO is moving beyond theory and lab testing. As a next step, ASO should enter the pilot stage. To make it to everyday rail operations, operational trials with rail freight operators need to be expanded. ASO needs testing in real-world conditions and alongside the people who will come to work with it every day.
Furthermore, Antonello Grozea adds that ASO should be enhanced technologically (perception and decision-support capabilities) and be integrated with digital freight train concepts.