SBB, Switzerland

www.sbb.ch

The Federal Office of Transport (FOT) is the supervisory authority responsible for public transport in Switzerland (railways, cableways, ships, trams and buses). Large areas of freight transport also fall within the FOT's remit. The FOT is responsible for safety, finance and infrastructure, as well as the legal and political frameworks of public and freight transport.

The system manager ETCS has the task to develop and to implement all the necessary basic principles and requirements of the ETCS technology on the Swiss railway standard gauge network for all the various players. It is the goal to set the same specifications and operating rules for all the IU and RU in Switzerland.

Fourteen infrastructure managers (IM's) and much more of railway undertakers (RU's) are obligated to implement and to operate ETCS.

ERTMS Deployment

The Swiss Federal Office of Transport (FOT) communicated and published in 2000 the principles and the strategy for the migration of the existing old Swiss class B train control systems (SIGNUM / ZUB) to ETCS on the Swiss standard gauge rail network. The migration strategy to

The fulfilment of the technical interoperability by an international harmonised standard
The fast replacement of the lineside part of the SIGNUM / ZUB system by ETCS L1 LS allows the use of only one train control system (ETCS) on the vehicle side. This reduces trainborne a significant amount of costs for the procurement, operating and the maintenance.
The deployment of ETCS L1 LS avoids the need to upgrade immediately all the lineside relay interlocking systems.
For existing vehicles which are not operated on ETCS L2 lines, there is no need for an immediate upgrade to ETCS. With the lineside migration to ETCS L1 LS, the installed balises allow also the operation with the trainborne ZUB / SIGNUM equipment (by using packet 44).

2011 the FOT clarified the ETCS strategy for the general migration to ETCS L2 for the time frame from 2025 upwards.

2012 the FOT put into force a directive for the migration to ETCS L1 LS. Fourteen infrastructure managers (IM’s) are obliged to implement ETCS along a network of around 3850 km. SBB, the biggest IM in Switzerland, is responsible for around 3000 km.

2017 this decision is ongoing being examined by the FOT based on the experience to date and subject to consultation of the innovation project called “SmartRail 4.0”.

2021 the FOT presented the new ERTMS strategy in which is described how ERTMS shall be deployed until 2040. The long-term solution shall be based on a new interlocking according to RCA.

The following lines will be placed into service with ETCS L2

Then all the lines without Vezia-Capolago are in service today.

A) Infrastructure

In Switzerland there are no lines in the category High Speed.

Up to now, the following lines (most double track) are placed into service with ETCS L2:

Mattstetten-Rothrist (NBS) and Derendingen-Inkwil (ABS)

Part of corridor RALP (Mattstetten-Rothrist)
Baseline 2.2.2+, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: July 2006
Track length: 45 km
Passenger and freight trains (freight trains only in night)
Maximum speed: 200 km/h
Number of trains in 2017: 101’920
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Alstom

Lötschberg Base Tunnel (LBT)

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: June 2007
Track length: 34 km
Passenger and freight trains
Maximum speed: 200 km/h
Number of trains in 2017: 37’154
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

Brunnen-Altdorf-Erstfeld

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: August 2015
Track length: 19 km
Maximum speed: 160 km/h
Passenger and freight trains
Number of trains in 2017: 74’900
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

Bodio-Pollegio north-Biasca-Giustizia-Castione

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: December 2015
Track length: 17 km
Maximum speed: 160 km/h
Passenger and freight trains
Number of trains in 2017: 79’800 trains
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

Gotthard Base Tunnel (GBT)

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: December 2016
Track length: 57 km
Maximum speed: 200 km/h
Passenger and freight trains
Number of trains in 2017: 44’200
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

Lausanne-Pully

Part of Conventional Network
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Initial operation: April 2017
Track length: 29 km
Maximum speed: 160 km/h
Passenger and freight trains
Number of trains in 2017: 54’395 trains
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

The following lines will be placed into service with ETCS L2

Giubiasco-Sant Antonino

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1
Planned for placing into service: May 2018
Track length: 11 km
Passenger and freight trains
Supplier of the lineside equipment:>

Sion-Sierre

Part of Conventional Network
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1.1
Planned for placing into service: October 2018
Track length: 25 km
Passenger and freight trains
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Siemens

Ceneri Base Tunnel

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline 2.3.0d, M_Version = 1.1
Planned for placing into service: December 2020
Track length: 16 km
Passenger and freight trains
Supplier of the lineside equipment: Thales

Vezia-Capolago

Part of corridor RALP
Baseline not yet specified
Planned for placing into service: around 2023 but not finally fixed
Passenger and freight trains

B) Rolling Stock

Around 1100 locos/trains are actually equipped with ETCS consisting of about 30 different vehicle types with 4 different on-board unit suppliers.

The Swiss standard gauge network (aprox. 3’800 km) is fully equipped with ETCS L1LS by the end of 2018.