COST Action TU1103
Operation and safety of LRTs in interaction with public space
Meeting Nº4
Minutes
Date:
25 th February 2013 (9:00-18:00 h)
26 th February 2013 (9:00-17:30 h)
27 th February 2013 (8:30-11:30 h)
Venue:
RPA (Railway Procurement Agency)
Maldron Hotel, Dublin, Ireland
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 1
Content
1. List of participants...... 3
2. Welcome by the Chair...... 4
3. Adoption of the agendas for the whole meeting...... 4
4. Welcome by RPA...... 4
5. Working Groups sessions ...... 4
6. Working Groups’ reporting session ...... 4
7. Technical presentation by Matus Sucha ...... 6
8. Technical visit of Dublin Luas network ...... 6
9. Management Committee concluding meeting ...... 8
10. Closing of the meeting ...... 10
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 2
1. List of participants
Marjolein DE JONG
Laetitia FONTAINE
Klara MACSINKA
Marine MILLOT
Olatz ORTIZ
Margarita NOVALES
Dominique BERTRAND
Joan CARSI
Carlos GAIVOTO
Matteo IGNACCOLO
Dirk LANGENSIEPEN
Osvaldo MANSO
Christian MARTI
Franck MONTI
Reddy MORLEY
Robert Jan ROOS
Dominique SCHMITT
Reinhold SCHRÖTER
Michael SCHWERTNER
Cees SMIT
Jan SPOUSTA
Matus SUCHA
Manuel TEIXERA
Derek TIERNEY
Markus ULLMANN
David WALMSLEY
Ulrich WEIDMANN
Tony YOUNG
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 3
MONDAY 25 TH OF FEBRUARY
2. Welcome by the Chair The Chair of the Action, Laetitia Fontaine, welcomed all the participants.
3. Adoption of the agendas for the whole meeting The Chair presented the proposed agenda posted on the website.
There are some changes in the schedule as the presentation of new countries to the group (Belgium, Hungary) during the first day (25 th February) or the inclusion of the budget overview during the last day (27 th February).
4. Welcome by RPA Pat O’Donoghue, RPA Director Design and Construction, made a presentation about the LUAS light rail system for Dublin.
5. Working Groups sessions The Chair introduced the WG sessions and reminded to all the participants that there will be a presentation from each WG leader the next morning, to show the progress made by each one of them.
Then the 3 Working Groups went on separate meetings during the whole afternoon. See each Working Groups’ Minutes for details.
TUESDAY 26 TH OF FEBRUARY
6. Working Groups’ reporting session Reinhold Schröter, Chair of WG1, made a presentation about what they have done until now.
They have made the glossary of terms related to the Action and they intend to improve it in the following months.
They are preparing and filling in a frame with regulations and guidelines from the different countries participating in the Action. They have made a distinction between EU level and countries, and a distinction between regulations concerning closely urban insertion and others. The countries, which have not fulfilled the frame at present, are: Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and Poland.
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 4
Core questions have been sent to “missing countries”. WG1 may extend these questions to all countries.
A global view per country has been proposed and sent to all participating countries for global data.
The next steps from now on are: Skype videoconferences (with dates already fixed); work via website/forum; all data gathered for Mid-May; and exchange of information with WG2 and WG3.
Dominique Bertrand, Chair of WG2, made a presentation about what they have done until now.
As agreed in previous meetings, they are working first on the data collection process, rather than on data themselves, considering qualitative approaches as well as statistical ones. On the other hand, it is not only accidents that are interesting but also other information like near missed accidents, emergency braking recording, CCTV or occurrence books.
The objective is to get a harmonized reporting of the situation in all countries, based on a contents draft, as well as a list of indicators used in statistical approach. A new deadline has been set (end of March), in order to leave enough time to build a synthesis for the end of WP1.
The contribution of some countries is still missing: Germany and Italy have made a partial contribution; Netherlands and Poland have not contributed yet, neither the new members (just involved in the Action or in the Working Group), which are Portugal, United Kingdom, Belgium and Hungary.
It seems that a Short Term Scientific Mission could be used to gather information from some partners (i.e. UK, Belgium) or help on synthesis.
On the other hand, it is expected that the UITP LRT committee will give information about some other countries.
Manuel Teixeira, Chair of WG3, made a presentation about what they have done until now.
The WG3 is generating some documents that help to understand the infrastructure conception process of a light rail system, including the disciplines involved in each part of the process. One of the objectives is to identify the main difficulties and concerns/alerts during the design process (interaction between parties, most important technical issues...). Preparing a Questionnaire to be sent to the Entities will fulfil this objective (good option for a Short Term Scientific Mission).
On the other hand, WG3 is preparing the list of networks in operation in the participating countries. By now the only information gathered is related to the city where the network is, and the detailed information about network km, vehicles, etc., will be gathered later. The list of networks is planned to be finished by 15 th May.
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 5
Finally, WG3 has identified the main hot spots in LRT lines/networks and a document is being prepared with some examples of good and bad practices in these hot spots, gathered among the participants in the Action. The final document is planned to be finished by 15 th April.
The WG3 is planning a new meeting in Porto during 6-7th May 2013 for making the altogether analysis of the information gathered and the documentation produced.
The final step of the WG3 during Working Phase 1 is the preparation of the WG3 Final Report and Presentation, which is planned to be finished for Berlin meeting (10 th June).
7. Technical presentation by Matus Sucha Matus Sucha, from Palacky University in Olomouc, Czech Republic, made a presentation about a current research work dealing with human factor in traffic: “Why we act in the traffic the way we do?”
8. Technical visit of Dublin Luas network
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 6
From 13:00 to 17:30 the technical visit to Dublin Luas network was led by RPA (Eamonn O'Modharin, Projects/Infrastructure Manager - Veolia Transport Ireland, Derek Tierney and Reddy Morley).
Description of the route we took during the visit: • Red Line: • Luas Spencer Dock bridge • Terminus for the C1 Red Line extension • To the Abbey Street Luas Stop: both on street shared and on street segregated tramway • We then walked from the Abbey Street Stop along the proposed new Luas Cross City (LCC) extension to St Stephen’s Green. This route took us past the new Dublin City Council Marlborough Street Public Transport Priority Bridge over the River Liffey, and via O’Connell St, Westmoreland St, College Green, Dawson St and onto the Luas Green Line city centre terminus at St Stephen’s Green. • Red Line: • St Stephen’s Green Luas Stop to the Sandyford Luas Stop. • On route to Sandyford, we travelled from St Stephen’s Green along Harcourt Street and onto the Charlemont Luas Stop: from here the Green Line runs along a segregated section and railway cutting which was a former heavy rail alignment, crossing a number of at grade road junctions. • The Green Line Luas tram depot and maintenance facility are located beside the Sandyford Luas Stop. • B1 Green Line extension to Leopardstown Valley Luas Stop via the Luas bridge over the roundabout at Sandyford. • From the Green Line St Stephen’s Green Luas Stop, we walked over to the Red Line Luas Stop at Abbey Street. • Red Line: • To the Smithfield Luas Stop. • From the Smithfield Luas Stop we walked along the Red Line to Sean Heuston Bridge, just short of the Heuston Luas Stop. • The walk along the Red Line between Smithfield Luas Stop the Sean Heuston Bridge brought us through narrow city streets that included both on street shared and on street segregated tramways. This section also included a large number of at grade road junctions. • Junction of Benburb St and Blackhall Place: a red light camera is in place to monitor motor vehicles passing red lights. • At the Junctions of Benburb St/Blackhall Place and Benburb St/Queen St the following mitigation measures are also in place to prevent road traffic accidents between motor vehicles/cyclists and trams; flashing road studs in the carriageway surface that are synchronised with the adjacent red traffic lights; high friction carriageway surfacing; oversized advanced warning signs; and the disabling of the tram demand detection loop which consequently required that all trams have to stop at the junction of Benburb St and Blackhall Place. MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 7
• Along Benburb St to Sean Heuston.
WEDNESDAY 27 TH OF FEBRUARY
9. Management Committee concluding meeting Several issues were discussed and agreed during the meeting, in relation to the following points:
Dissemination action and Editorial Committee:
Dominique Bertrand proposed to merge the Dissemination team and the Editorial Committee (both set up after Stuttgart meeting), as their functions are rather close, especially in terms of production, and some persons are involved in both. The Management Committee agreed to merge both Committees; members are: Matus Sucha (leader), Margarita Novales, David Walmsley, Michael Rosenberger and Dominique Bertrand.
Newsletter number 1 about the Action:
The first draft of Newsletter number 1 was presented to the MC for validation.
Some aspects of the Newsletter were discussed, as the possibility of including names and e-mail contacts of the members for each Institution on page 3. Finally, it was decided that names of the members should be included per entity, but not email addresses. A sentence wil be added below the table to invite readers to contact the webmaster if they want to get in touch with one partner (webmaster’s email will be put there, an active link to the Action’s webpages is available on last page).
The Management Committee validated this proposal, and global design of the newsletter. The final draft will be set up by Editorial Committee, and validated by MC Chair as responsible for pubication of the Action.
Dissemination strategy:
Reinhold Schröter mentioned discussion in WG1 and suggested that every item requires approval by the Management Committee. There is deep concern in the German supporting group about the COST project: therefore, they will be careful about public news and information, because inferior messages or insufficient quality of publications and presentations can strengthen the idea of a project, which is not perfect. So, there is a definitive need for approval by the MC for every publication or presentation on our COST Action.
Cees Smit said that results are no absolute tangible objects or subjects. Information will always be enriched by new data. So, the right moment for publication is not easy to determine. His point of view is rather similar with that of Reinhold (quality is necessary), but he believes that we don't
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 8
have to wait until everything is 100% sure and certain: the day after that moment, new information can be added and then, it becomes less certain.
Marjolein De Jong added that results are part of the process and that we can communicate about the process, as well as about the results at that moment: what do we know and which questions do we have? But we shouldn't state anything we are not sure about.
Dominique Bertrand explained suggested rules of management and précised that Editorial Committee members are MC members, too, representing the MC.
Manuel Teixeira suggested leaving dissemination to the Dissemination Committee.
For Reinhold Schröter, this Committee is responsible for setting up the frame and validation refers to content. It is better to keep those two things apart.
Dominique Bertrand said that it is important to have several authors if an abstract is written on behalf of the Action.
Laetitia Fontaine explained that the purposes of conferences are: 1) to make the action known and 2) to get interesting contacts and studies.
Reinhold Schröter said that it is crucial to define clearly what should be presented. As long as there are no results, it should be general on the methods and aims of the Action.
Laetitia Fontaine specified that an abstract on the Action should at this stage be general and based on the MoU, as the Newsletter – not on results. For the moment, the main aim is to communicate on the action in general, as long as results are not yet available. She suggested that a general message would be set up and used for such abstracts. Finally, the MC decided that
- The suggestion of Editorial Committee will be tried till next MC session, by testing the proposed strategy at first opportunities according to deadlines (1 st one is Transportation Research Arena in 2014, whose deadline is 29 th of March 2013).
- Editorial Committee will set up a general abstract.
- Financial costs for conference participation should be validated and COST reimbursement would be done for participation on behalf of the Action.
Dominique Bertrand encouraged comments on the dissemination strategy.
Moreover, Matus Sucha is managing the table with conferences; so, interesting conferences should be sent to him. This also applies for interesting journals, where technical articles could be written about the Action.
Finally, the suggestion that Chair and Vice Chair could present together at the TRA has been made and validated by MC.
Frame for the final guide: MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 9
Laetitia Fontaine presented a draft for a frame for the final guide. MC and WG leaders in particular are asked to read the guideline and comment on it on the website. In June, a more detailed proposal with content could be discussed.
Approval of financial support for the meeting expenses in Dublin:
RPA covered all the cost without asking for reimbursement.
Annual Progress Conference:
In mid-2013, Laetitia Fontaine will present some results of our Action in the Annual Progress Conference.
Action Plan:
Laetitia Fontaine presented the Action plan and asks participants to use this tool to keep each other aware of progress of the Action.
New countries participation:
MC validated Belgian and Hungarian participation in this COST Action and welcomed them.
10. Closing of the meeting Laetitia Fontaine thanked all the participants for their attendance, and particularly our Irish hosts for welcoming us and for convenient logistical conditions, and closed officially the meeting.
MC Meeting nº 4 - Minutes 10