Cisco
Cisco Connected Rail
Greater Safety, Mobility, and Efficiency
Connected Rail solution was developed by a transportation focused engineering team to address the needs and outcomes of a modernizing transit agency. In short, it is a set of validated reference architectures, design documentation, and implementation guides that were also co-created with global rail industry stakeholders. The solution is comprised of the appropriate data center, wired and wireless networking, security, software and services necessary to enable the most demanding rail applications. Further, Cisco Connected Rail consists of three primary systems Cisco Connected Train, Connected Trackside, and Connected Station. Through proven and well-established standards based technologies, Cisco Connected Rail solutions maximize implementation success and significantly reduce installation risk, cost and deployment time.
Benefits
Cisco Connected Rail helps you:
- Lower operating expenses and simplify maintenance by consolidating multiple singlepurpose applications onto one converged, open-standards IP network, and by taking advantage of predictive capabilities that can recommend improvements in advance
- Increase ridership through onboard Wi-Fi, on-demand entertainment services, and passenger information displays
- Enhance passenger and employee safety with improved video surveillance, automated compliance measures, and other automated systems that reduce human error and related mishaps
- Deploy new services with high-speed train-to-trackside wireless infrastructure
- Generate more revenue with greater advertising capabilities, increased ridership, and more station and trackside businesses
Challenges in the Rail Industry
Oftentimes, sunk costs hold investment back. Yet encouraging operators to consider ROI over a longer term can lead them to build a foundational future infrastructure and concurrently solve these problems with Cisco Connected Rail:
- Aging systems, which require an increased effort to maintain and are prone to fail more often, resulting in increased costs and safety concerns
- Downtime issues intensified by different levels of reliability between systems
- Compliance issues, since safety mandates now require automated capabilities between trains and back-end systems
- Safety and security concerns, such as train crashes and network breaches
- Passengers’ need for Wi-Fi access and more amenities while commuting
The Rail of the Future: Converged Network Capabilities
The optimal scenario is a converged network that complements existing systems while enabling smooth migration to next-generation capabilities. This is possible with Cisco Connected Rail, whose architecture includes validated network designs for Connected Train, Trackside, and Station.
