Mobilissimus was present for the second year in a row at the Railways Days event in Bucharest, responding to the invite of our friends and partners from Club Feroviar to attend the anniversary 20th edition.
On this occasion, our colleague Dragoș Hrițuleac proposed for discussion a less debated topic with a significant impact on services’ attractiveness: accessibility to railway infrastrucure and services for those travelling with a bike, cycle tourists and commuters alike.
The two-days event represented the ideal opportunity for us to carry out a “temperature check” of the latest progress of the railway industry in Romania, and it came with plenty of great surprises and good news. We salute our railway colleagues for their efforts to attract and utilise the EU resilience funds for stock renewal and retrofitting, for a more modern fleet. Furthermore, it is exciting to hear that early feasibility work is underway to understand the implications of introducing high speed railways in Romania (speed of 160-200km/h and above). Regarding the freight rail transport, the emergence of Carpatica Feroviar appears to instil new life in the sector.
Urban rail also demonstrated significant progress, with many local authorities procuring new tram stock. The authorities of Oradea took the lead on the introduction of tram-train projects, with inspiration from Karlsruhe (GER) and Sheffield (UK). Nationally, Alstom placed themselves as a key player in delivering modern carriages for light rail options, but also has the lead on train rolling stock, by being the manufacturer of the first new train to be put in operation after 1989. The new depot in Griviței (Bucharest) visited by the participants illustrated the capacity of the of the manufacturer, but also the limitations of only having one depot to service new trin stock across the country.
Our professional angle is placed at the interface between railways and all other modes of transport – for the conference, the focus was on the integration of railway services and active mobility. Using bikes on trains is an increasingly popular recreational activity, as well as responding to the burning need to enable commuting using sustainable modes (trains and bikes). Our colleague emphasised the incredible potential posed by offering attractive solutions for enticing more tourists across the network, including those cycle touring. This is highly relevant for the plans initiated by authorities such as Timiș County Council, as part of their Vero-Timiș strategy. At national level, the strategic relevance of trains offering spaces for bike is associated with the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility, where the central government committed to developing over 3000km of cycle touring routes, with a large proportion overlapping the EuroVelo long distance cycling network. The route certification for EuroVelo standards is conditioned by having public transport links which accept bikes on board at least every 150km (ideally every 75km, with min. 6 services per day, taking at least 4 fully assembled bikes, with easy access). Most counties along the Danube River (EuroVelo 6) are expected to make effort to comply to this, in collaboration with the train operators, to ensure the RFF funding is successfully absorbed – we are already collaborating with Timiș and other three neighbouring counties to ensure that the section they are responsible for, part of “Cu Bicicleta in Vest” RFF project, will consider this aspect.
The current challenges are numerous, from the lack of integration across operators and ticketing options for cyclists, to lack of services accepting bikes on board. The efforts made by the civil society to normalise the presence of bikes on train demonstrated the interest, so now the industry and operators are needed on board to meet this demand. The competing priorities should in fact be regarded concurrent opportunities, where new investments should also cover the integration of cycle users and their specific needs when modernising the rolling stock or IT&C infrastructure.
We hope that the participants had an engaging and stimulating experience, to the same extent we enjoy the event.
