The objective of the proposal is research in semantic, ontology based automation of transformations between heterogeneous data formats, and its application to a complex ‘after-sales’ process use case in an actual run-time demonstration scenario. The technology will leverage Shift2Rail Interoperability Framework (IF) components developed in the IT2Rail “lighthouse” project, extending it for use in related Shift2Rail projects under the “S2R-CFM-IP4-01-2015: Shopping, booking and ticketing of multimodal travel solutions” and “S2R-CFM-IP4-02-2015: Travel companion and tracking services” calls. The project will additionally provide a case scenario for exercising the Governance and management structure developed under the related “S2R-OC-IP4-01-2016: IF Governance, ensuring its market uptake and sustainability” call. The objectives will be achieved through a partnership of specialist participants including research institutions, a major European rail operator, industry associations representing the rail sector and public transportation authorities, and industrial providers of mission critical ICT solutions to the rail sector. Participants, which are also involved in the original consortium of designers for the IF in IT2Rail, will perform work organised in specific work packages focused on fundamental industrial research in semantic web technologies. These technologies will comprise ontology engineering and automated semantic transformations, in a dedicated work package, to provide the actual runtime demonstration scenario of the application of such technology to transformations of existing European TAP-TSI specification exchanges executed on an existing industrial platform for such exchanges. The project extends the capabilities of the IF as described in the Shift2Rail Multi Annual Action Plan contributing to the realisation of a distributed semantic “web of transport” integrating the TAP-TSI specification as one of its elements.

The concept of Interoperability Framework (IF) is at the core of the Shift2Rail Innovation Programme (IP) 4, and it is the key concept for facilitating a seamless travel experience for users across borders and modes. The IF enables the technical interoperability of heterogeneous, multimodal transport-related services by relieving applications from the task of locating, harmonizing and understanding multiple and independent data and event sources, services, etc. A series of past and ongoing projects related to Shift2Rail IP4 (IT2Rail, ST4RT, GOF4R, CONNECTIVE) have developed and are refining and extending a set of core concepts and technologies that are part of the IF. The Semantics for PerfoRmant and scalable INteroperability of multimodal Transport (SPRINT) project will improve key aspects of the Shift2Rail IF to bring the market uptake of the multimodal transport ecosystem envisioned by IP4 closer to reality. In particular, the project will address the following specific challenges posed by the objectives of TD4.1 objectives and explicitly addressed by the S2R-OC-IP4-01-2018 call: • Improve IF performance and scalability to sustain a large deployment. • Simplify/automate all the necessary steps needed to integrate new services and sub-systems in the IP4 ecosystem. To this end, the project will: • Define a reference architecture for the Shift2Rail IF, which will take into account recent advances in the design and development of distributed systems, and in particular of cloud-based ones. • Define techniques facilitating – in particular by increasing their level of automation –activities that are central to the concept of IF, such as the collaborative creation and management of ontologies and of semantic-based mappings between heterogeneous data representations. • Demonstrate the proposed improvements to the IF through a proof-of-concept implementation that will reach at least TRL 4.

The VITE proposal is addressed to the call S2R-OC-IP2-02-2015-IT virtualization of testing environment. The main objective of VITE proposal is to reduce on-site tests for signalling systems leading to reducing overall testing costs. To achieve this main objective the work is organized in two main streams: First, to propose a testing framework by carefully analysing user’s needs and current situation and from there building a process that can be accepted by all railway stakeholders and whose main strength will be to perform as many tests as possible in the lab. An analysis of uncertainties and a simulation of GSMR QoS as well as a proposed methodology for test protocols optimisation will also be addressed. Secondly, to propose a standard architecture for the lab testing including the interface specifications for both the connection between real equipment and the lab tools as for the connection between different labs for remote testing. This architecture will be developed together with some SW tools that will help to automatise lab testing. To validate the test process framework and the lab architecture demonstrations by the participating labs using real track and train data from three of the most significant European countries deploying ETCS (Spain, Italy and Belgium), as well as an assessment by NoBos, DeBos and users from these three countries are also foreseen. Finally VITE has some dissemination and coordination actions to ensure the success and usefulness of the project in particular regarding the coordination with S2R-CFM-IP2-01-2015 and other S2R initiatives. The expected impact of the project is to significantly contribute to the development of a Zero Onsite testing environment. The VITE consortium involves users (RU and IM), independent labs, NoBos/DeBos and engineering and technological companies, all of them leading companies in the railway sector and in particular in signalling and ERTMS. This consortium thus complements the know-how and expertise of the S2R JU members.

In a fast moving environment, access to information about options for travel that is instant, easy to use, attractive to customers, and authoritative is vital. Therefore a one-stop-mobility shop, acting as a personal mobility assistant, is the key to offer citizens an alternative that challenges car ownership. New technologies can play a crucial role for a large scale and stable business operation of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) at a global level. Interoperability Framework, Travel Shopping, Booking and Ticketing, Validation, Payment and Trip Tracking are technologies developed within Shift2Rail IP4 to meet the engineering challenges associated with leveraging current actions on establishing open-data policies and data exchange standardization. Given this, the main goal of Shift2MaaS is to support the uptake of the IP4 technology and overcome the technical and non-technical barriers for the adoption of new integrated mobility platforms. Shift2MaaS aims to support the introduction of Shift2Rail IP4 technology within the MaaS context by analysing the needs in terms of technology enablers of the different stakeholders involved, and demonstrating the benefits of IP4 through pilot demonstrators of collective and shared mobility services and the seamless passenger experience. To this end, Shift2MaaS will co-design and validate advanced use-cases for the deployment and implementation of COHESIVE solutions. The Shift2MaaS impact is validated and assessed in three European sites, all strongly engaged in the intermodality and MaaS domain, and setting specific actions on existing or new MaaS schemes. Shift2MaaS thus builds on and adds to previous projects by makes the connection to real environments. Shift2MaaS will also analyse regulatory and behavioural aspects of the IP4 multimodal transport services market place on business logics, on the creation of new business models and on the behavioural / demand response of passengers; contributing to an overall economic assessment.

The Commission’s 2011 White Paper states that by 2050, rail should substantially expand its modal share over medium and long distances. This is consistent with the Policy goals of expanding rail capacity, both cited in the Horizon 2020 and Shift2Rail (S2R) calls. Considering the ambitious Horizon 2020 Key Performance Indicator (KPI) calling for a surge in the utilisation of capacity within a range 70-90%, yards, hubs and terminals play a key role in facilitating this step-change by contributing to a competitive, reliable and safe freight transport. To meet the needs of S2R and Horizon 2020, OptiYard will design decision support tool for yard managers that will help them to optimise processes and manage their yards more efficiently. It will do this in real-time, with interaction with relevant network. The processes must be performed in real-time, to guarantee on-time delivery and operational efficiency, in particular, for single wagon transport. OptiYard addresses critical operational points of the transport chain (both rail marshalling yards or as transfer points to other modes) to improve capacity and reliability. OptiYard will facilitate real-time interaction between yard and relevant network IT systems that allow for software based planning and ultimately optimisation of single wagonload and blocktrain operational processes. Building on the current state of the art and practice, the ambition of OptiYard is to provide a fully functional software module where real-time yard management, interaction with the network and ad-hoc timetable planning will be simulated in real-time. The optimization module and algorithms will be proven for large and complex freight transport networks, and integrate well with IP5 activities towards automation, e.g. intelligent assets and automated shunting and mainline operations.