Frequentis: Enabling safe operations 24/7

Frequentis’ Richard Ellis-Edwards explains how choosing the right incident management solution can help rail operators maximise service continuity.

In an increasingly customer-centric world, it is no longer enough to preserve safety at all times – this is a given. Instead, the quality of a provider’s response when the unexpected happens is what builds an exceptional brand reputation.

No matter how efficient the overall performance of heavy and light rail operators, disruptions are inevitable with signalling issues, power failures, or seasonal challenges among just some of the issues that may cause significant delays and even cancellations

It is therefore essential that an incident management solution is in place to put operators in the best position to communicate critical information to the relevant stakeholders and to ensure the necessary steps are taken to identify and fix the root causes quickly and efficiently.

“Railways are committed to delivering highly reliable, safe and punctual train services and any deviation caused by an incident presents challenges to regular operations and reacting incorrectly can result in service disruptions,” said Richard Ellis-Edwards, Public Transport New Business Development Manager at Frequentis – a global supplier of communication and information systems for control centres with safety-critical tasks.

“A modern incident management system must mitigate this risk, facilitating prompt service restoration while adhering to relevant rules and regulations.”

Frequentis has a proven track record in assisting multiple operators worldwide to realise the benefits of efficient and effective incident and crisis management with its control centre solutions.

The organisation believes that solution of incident management rest on three functional pillars – decision support, communication support and workflow support.

Richard said: “By deploying an incident-management solution that embodies these capabilities and works seamlessly within complex, ever-evolving technology landscapes, transport organisations can improve their ability to respond rapidly and effectively. Ultimately, this will support them in providing more reliable, punctual and satisfying services to their customers.

“Such information management systems are now so interconnected with other internal and external systems that they should not be considered in isolation.”

The Frequentis solution philosophy is therefore to take a scalable, open, flexible approach based on modular systems that integrate freely with each other, with existing on-premises technologies and with technologies used by external partners.

“The system should permit sizing to suit the exact needs of each organisation and should provide essential functionality and standard interfaces “out of the box”, with the possibility of extensive customisation,” added Richard.

“Prompt restoration of normal services after an incident depends on having a highly integrated platform with the following capabilities, presented in the natural order from detection through resolution to post-incident reporting.

“Public transport organisations need to understand the “what, where, when” of every potential incident as soon as possible, through an incident management solution that seamlessly integrated with other upstream and downstream systems.

“We can help organisations in the rail industry create shared situational awareness through technology that gathers and disseminated information between all relevant internal and external shareholders, including tailored updates to end customers.”

Austrian Federal Railways, ÖBB, and Sydney Trains are among the operators to have achieved successful incident management through centralisation and cooperation, allowing them to increase the speed at which incidents are resolved.

This is thanks to the Frequentis Incident and Crisis Management (ICM) solution, that is a combined information, alerting and recording tool for the operational management of incidents and emergencies.

“The ongoing shift from decentralised to centralised operations requires a holistic solution tailor-made to the needs of railway operators that connects all relevant stakeholders and streamlines their incident management workflow,” said Richard.

“Based on a comprehensive product suite, this solution leads the operator through incidents and emergencies, instantly identifying internal and external stakeholders, automating and streamlining the communication process, while also logging every activity to satisfy legal requirements.”

Frequentis public transport solutions leverage more than 70 years of experience focusing on safety-critical communications and applications.

Richard added: Cross-industry expertise gained from supporting control central communication sets the foundation for industry-leading railway and urban transport solutions.

“With a strong position in operations communication, as well as incident and crisis management, Frequentis holds the number one market share in GSM-R dispatcher terminal positions – more than 8,000 units are currently deployed in customer control centres in over 25 countries.”

Praising the ICM, Geoff Howard, Rail Operations Centre Programme Director at Sydney Trains, said: “This is a game changer for Sydney Trains. It is bringing together all of the disparate operational components into one central place called the Rail Operations Centre, because things happen on the network and we have to accept that, but this is about improving that communication flow.

“The feedback has been that the product is really, really solid, they see the tool, they see immediately what benefit it can bring them, it has been configured to what they required, and the training and introduction has been seamless.”

Visit www.frequentis.com for more details.

• You can also meet the team at the Railtex and Infrarail event from September 7-9 in Hall 12, Stand G06.

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