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Updated EXTRACTS from EPISODE 96/010, dated 14.6.96:
The Comité Européen de Normalisation (CEN) is one of several European organisations responsible for standardisation.
CEN is involved with the standards being developed for issues relating to RDS-TMC applications, particularly in terms of messages and locations to be referenced. Working Group 4 of CEN Technical Committee 278, has a work plan which covers these applications.
Sub Working Group 4.1, covering the RDS-TMC standards (currently referenced as ENV12313-1 and as ENV12313-2) derived from the "ALERT C" protocol, has included representatives from Bosch, CENELEC TC 107 (now TC 207), CCETT, EBU,
ERTICO, UK Department of Transport, NL Ministry of Transport, Philips, ARD/SDR and Volvo.
Sub Working Group 7.3, covering "Location Referencing Rules" (currently referenced as prENV278/7/3/0005) for RDS-TMC, includes representatives from Bosch, CRC, CETE Méditerrannée, CSELT Cartography, EGT, ERTICO, Intergraph EHQ, NL Ministry of Transport, Philips, Sagem, Siemens AG, Sony Telecom, Tele Atlas, Tritel, Vägverket and Volvo.
To permit industry to develop RDS-TMC receivers, these groups aimed at completing by 1994 their pre-standards, but they did not achieve this because individual results needed from the DRIVE programme were delayed. The EC, rightly, decided not to progress the development of the "ALERT C" specification without field trial results.
These standards work plans have proceeded through 1995/6 and continued to occupy the SWG's into 1997. It is unlikely that these ENVs will be formally published in final form before 1998.
This is the European organisation in charge of European standards in the electrotechnical sector. The Technical Committee TC 107 (now called TC 207) issued the original RDS specification, based upon the EBU specification, as European Standard EN 50067:1990. An updated, and still current version was issued in 1992 with an allocation for the type 8A group to carry RDS-TMC. It was assumed that the "ALERT C" protocol would be added to the RDS standard when completely finalised within the DRIVE II projects, but this work was activated in the CEN organisation.
Previously the EBU had taken the lead in the standardisation process through its Specialist Group R/RDS of its Technical Committee. Since this Group was dissolved at the end of 1992, no new arrangements were made with CENELEC in support of its TC 107 Group. Subsequently, in early 1995 the RDS Forum became active in this field as the generally recognized competent body to work on pre-standards issues and to then forward any work to CENELEC. During 1996/7, the RDS Forum, at the request of RDS operators and TMC developers, has produced a new draft Standard prEN50067: 1997 which specifically includes the ODA feature allowing full TMC functionality, which is now recognised to be required.
The European Commission comprises many different Directorates, each with specific sector interests. Each Directorate is divided into Sections concerning specific matters and two directorate sections have specific concerns with RDS-TMC technology.
DG VII - A2 is the Section for Transport, International Relations and Trans European Transport Network and Infrastructures, with concern for pilot projects and implementations associated with RDS-TMC, over the last 2 or 3 years and into the near term future. It supports the Euro-Regional Projects which are beginning to evaluate the complex institutional issues interlinked with RDS-TMC technology to be surmounted before fully effective RDS-TMC services can become available to users. In the field of Road Transport, RDS-TMC has long been a goal and it has recently received a strong impetus, being nominated a priority domain for development.
DG XIII - C6 is the Section for Telecommunications, Information Market and Exploitation of Research Telematics Applications for Transport and Environment, with concern for many developments associated with RDS-TMC, over the last 10 years or so. The projects of the Telematics Application Programme: Transport Sector (part of the 4th Framework Programme 1994 - 1998) are involved in the development, demonstration and validation of enhanced services to transport users. This work, which is coordinated with initiatives on the Trans European Networks, also consolidates on the results of the previous programmes of Research and Development concentrating on the need of users and the development of inter-operability.
In the field of Road Transport, RDS-TMC has long been a goal and funding was secured for the EPISODE Project and the FORCE Project who, among other things, are progressing the standards development in cooperation with the ECORTIS Project which has an emphasis on implementations. The former Projects have co-operated with the standards organisation, CEN to finalise the activity of several Working Groups and are now actively involved in disseminating information about the inter-related RDS-TMC standards, for all workers in this field, before they are eventually published.
ERTICO with its offices in Brussels brings together industry, public and private infrastructure operators (mainly road authorities and motorway companies), public authorities and as they say themselves, also users.
It is a partnership created in November 1991 on the initiative of a number of DRIVE project partners with the objective to supply support to the EC for the provision of a co-ordination service which was obviously required to ensure a higher degree of harmonization between the numerous projects. The legal entity of this "international association" is that of a Belgian Cooperative Company, having itself given the aim by its founders "to identify and promote an effective implementation strategy for the development of ATT (Advanced Transport Telematics) in road transport infrastructures, exploiting the results achieved by DRIVE, and other national research and development programmes, thus assuring smooth transition from pre-competitive R&D to the market-driven investment of sector actors".
Consequently ERTICO has objectives such as to define long term transport telematics requirements, to harmonise technical specifications and to coordinate and to verify application fields.
In the RDS-TMC area, ERTICO has taken action to co-ordinate a consolidated message catalogue which is based on the evaluation of all relevant DRIVE projects, in particular those of ALERT and STRADA. The coordination work of ERTICO became a large part of the DRIVE II programme and the corresponding project was called CORD. In the area of creating a European road database, ERTICO has also been active and has proposed harmonised coding rules based on ALERT and SOCRATES requirements. Another area of activity concerns the traffic data exchange format DATEX-NET, using the ISO standardised EDIFACT data communication protocol.
ERTICO now has the vision, established during 1995, to stimulate wide deployment of RDS-TMC and yet continue to evaluate other TTI options for the future, such as DAB delivery of TMC TTI messages.
For more information, go to the ERTICO Website
The EC 4th Framework Programme has accepted three vital projects to assist with coordination of RDS-TMC implementations over Europe in the 4th Framework Programme. The EPISODE project, proposed by the EBU started work in January 1996 and will run for 27 months with funding of only ECU 400,000 involving the EBU and eight national broadcasters.
The other two, much larger projects, are ECORTIS and FORCE starting in Autumn 1995 covering a period of some 39 months in total and with funding of ECU 7.8 million, involving more than 40 partners (with three of them being broadcasters) in all the EU member countries. The FORCE/ECORTIS projects aim to also provide major coordination among the sectors involved in implementing RDS-TMC using ALERT C on national and European level over the next two to three years. FORCE/ECORTIS will establish close liaison with EPISODE, and seek improvements for RDS-TMC functionality as implementations in the EU Member countries progress.
The FORCE Project WP 13.6 is involved through TC 278 SWG4.1 in the new group SSWG4.1 which has now been formed to work on ALERT Plus, which can provide additional status information, such as public transport information, car parking status and timetable information. Work, on ALERT Plus, is being undertaken in co-operation with a consortium of French companies planning to introduce the first implementation for Paris in Summer 1997.
For more information, go to the FORCE/ECORTIS Website
Many projects being undertaken in the field of Transport Telematics and Intelligent Transport Systems have RDS-TMC implications. The research projects have generally been funded with support from DG XIII. Whereas implementation and evaluation projects are carried out with support from DG VII, within the Trans-European Network for Transport (TEN-T) guidelines and budget.
European wide projects comprise: DEFI (now completed - it sought to define a common definition of the European RDS-TMC services); ECORTIS which is co-ordinating the implementation of RDS-TMC implementations to ensure the pan-European perspective of the national plans is met, and EDEN which deals with the network of Traffic Information Centres as the backbone for cross-border exchange of traffic and travel information for Europe.
The Euro-regional projects now underway are:
CENTRICO - co-ordinates the implementation plans for traffic management and user information services, for centrally located countries in Europe: Belgium and Luxembourg, and parts of France, Germany and The Netherlands; with the United Kingdom as an observer. During 1995 and 1996, a common action programme has been prepared focussing on monitoring, cross-border traffic management and re-routing, traffic information exchange, co-ordination of traffic centres, the implementation of ITS in conurbations, on-trip information through RDS-TMC and inter-operability of automatic toll collection. In 1996 and 1997, the remaining study work will be completed, and implementation projects will begin.
CORVETTE - will co-ordinate regional, bi-lateral and multi-lateral ITS implementation projects in the Alpine area covering Austria, parts of Germany (Bavaria) and the northern part of Italy. The project starts in Autumn 1996 and the main domains that have been identified are: traffic data collection and monitoring of conditions, data exchange, traffic management using Variable Message Signs, RDS-TMC traffic information services and automatic toll collection.
SERTI - co-ordinates the implementation of traffic management and user information services covering the southern region of Europe: adjacent parts of France, Germany, Italy and Spain. During 1996 and 1997, studies have been conducted and co-ordinated to define a common action programme covering monitoring, organisational problems, data exchange, traffic management using Variable Message Signs, RDS-TMC traffic information services, and pre-trip information services. In 1997, remaining study work will be finalised and implementation of the applications will begin, concentrating on the highest priorities in the action programme.
VIKING - will co-ordinate national and bi-lateral traffic management and ITS implementation projects in the northern part of Europe: Denmark and parts of Finland, northern Germany, Norway and Sweden. The co-ordination ensures continuity and a high quality of ITS services, and gives special attention to intermodal aspects - to support personal travel and freight haulage. The project starts in Autumn 1996 with preparatory steps already taken: consensus on traffic management on the northern part of the trans-European network, definition and harmonisation of services, information management and data exchange, RDS-TMC traffic information services, automatic toll collection and demand management, and traffic management in urban and peri-urban areas.
In course of preparation at time of report preparation.
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Issue date January 03, 2000
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