UIC has produced two new Interim GSM-R Specifications – the “EIRENE Functional Requirements Specification version 7.1” and the “EIRENE System Requirements Specification version 15.1. These specifications contain new features, which improve and facilitate the use of GSM-R, the dedicated rail radio communications system, and are considered strictly optional. This means they do not affect the EU Control Command and Signalling Technical Specifications for Interoperability (CCS-TSI). The GSM-R Specifications considered by the European TSI remain the EIRENE Functional Requirements Specification version 7 and the EIRENE System Requirements Specification version 15, part of TSI CCS – Annex A.

The EIRENE Interim Specifications were agreed upon with the European Railway Agency (ERA), the Community of European Railways and Infrastructure Companies (CER), the European Rail Infrastructure Managers’ Association (EIM), the Association of European Rail Industry (UNIFE) and the GSM-R Industry Group (GSM-R IG).
The specifications offer access to improved features such as Shunting, EIRENE Data Only Radio (EDOR) – only the FRS part – or Alerting of a Controller.

GSM-R has until now been rolled out over 65,000 km of track in Europe, and is also under implementation outside Europe (China, India, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Algeria).
It is expected that the roll-out of GSM-R in Europe will cover about 140, 000 km in 2015.

The interim specifications are presented in both a “clean” version and a version in which changes have been highlighted in yellow to indicate the points where the interim EIRENE versions differ from the “in force” (from the point of view of TSI) EIRENE versions.

They are available on the UIC website: http://gsm-r.uic.org