Faculty
Organizational structure

Specialized teaching facility intended especially for students of railway fields at the experimental line Kopidlno – Dolní Bousov in the Hradec Králové Region.

This project is a real example of connecting academia (the Faculty of Transportation Sciences) with the railway industry (the company AŽD). Students, academics and industry professionals meet here not only as part of standard teaching, but also while working on development projects.

The Center is conceived as an open teaching platform where students can try out a whole range of technologies and, with the help of AŽD experts, implement innovative projects that they would find hard to carry out under other conditions.

It includes a training hall with a capacity of 25 listeners and modular classroom arrangement according to the real needs of individual projects. There is also the state-of-the-art Unified Operator Workstation DIGITAL 4.0 with direct setting of train routes and operation of field elements.

The Czech railway industry has for some time been struggling with a lack of students and qualified specialists, among other things in the field of interlocking and telecommunication technology. It "competes" for these students with a whole range of other fields, and it is therefore necessary to show that railway transport is an attractive field and has a lot to offer.

The Center presents students and the wider professional community with modern interlocking and telecommunication technologies, represented both by station (Station-SWing ESA 51 Dětenice) and line (TrackSWing AHP-03D, AH-ESA) and level-crossing interlocking equipment (Gate-SWing PZZ-J, PZZ GTS, PZZ-ACE), which serves to ensure the safe railway operation of the designated technical equipment installed on the Kopidlno – Dolní Bousov line.

Training exhibit of the ESA interlocking equipment

The Center includes a school and training exhibit of a station interlocking system of the type ESA, which makes it possible to demonstrate its features, including integration with field elements.

The Kopidlno – Dolní Bousov line is equipped with the unified European train protection system ERTMS/ETCS Level 2, but it also serves for testing the use of variable eurobalises controlled by the LEU unit produced by AŽD of the type TrainSWing LEA-1.

The railway interlocking systems mentioned above, together with the communication and telecommunication systems listed below, should make it possible to subsequently introduce autonomous train operation on the experimental line.

Indoor part

The school and training exhibit of the station interlocking system of the type ESA, enabling training without any effect on the operation of the designated technical equipment, consists of:

• a cabinet of technological computers, including a simulator computer for simulating external elements,
• an operator workstation with the option of installing various types of operator control workstations (JOP),
• a cabinet of object controllers of the type EIP, providing the electronic interface to field elements (light signal, points, derail, warning device, barrier, post of the warning device for track crossings, electromagnetic lock, etc.) of both station and level-crossing interlocking equipment, i.e. to the field elements located near the training room of the competence center.

Field elements

Field elements of the interlocking equipment representing their basic and extended variants:

• entrance signal on a mast with LED lamps of the type FieldSWing LLA-2 (200 mm) in an assembly:
  • top indicator PUR-2 with yellow number 12,
  • top yellow light, green light, red light, white light and bottom yellow light,
  • bottom indicator PUR-2 with white number 12, green strip, yellow strip and white number 5,
• departure (or route) signal on a mast with incandescent lamps in an assembly:
  • top yellow light, green light, red light, white light and bottom yellow light,
  • bottom indicator FieldSWing PUR-2 with white number 12 and indicator FieldSWing UR-3 with green strip and yellow strip,
• dwarf shunting signal,
• points with a point machine with a hook lock and tongue position sensor,
• derail with a point machine,
• two axle counter sensors Frauscher of the type RSR 180,
• electromagnetic lock on a post,
• auxiliary signal box,
• level-crossing warning device V3 with a PZA-100 barrier with boom lamps,
• signalling device VZPK with one lamp and acoustic signalling of the type ASN-3,
• cable distribution box.

Communication and telecommunication systems

The Dětenice Competence Center is also equipped with other communication and telecommunication systems which, in line with the requirements of the Railway Administration (Správa železnic), should make it possible to remotely control the Kopidlno – Dolní Bousov line by a dispatcher from Kopidlno, as well as the testing and operation of an autonomous railway. Such systems include:

• remotely controlled public address system in Dětenice and at Domousnice halt,
• camera system for checking the platform at Dětenice railway station,
• intelligent stop Domousnice,
• railway radio system GSM-R,
• wireless communication network 5G (telecommunication transmitter BTS),
• ERTMS/ATO, i.e. the new railway radio system ERTMS/FRMCS.

Heading towards an autonomous railway

The Center is part of the wider experimental line project, on which the company AŽD intends to further develop and test autonomous rail vehicles intended for the line with future use in real operation with passengers.

Areas of future research include new systems for the recognition of objects and obstacles, autonomous train operation without the necessary participation of a person, precise vehicle positioning, ensuring train integrity, handling incidents and degraded situations, as well as other activities going beyond the area of the autonomous vehicle itself, which are linked to the whole experimental line and possibly also to the development tasks of the competence center.