On March 16 and 17, 2023, the Chief Engineers Board of RZD JSCo held a meeting in Chelyabinsk. Representatives of the corps of Engineers of railroads and central directorates, departments, design and engineering bureaus and the research industrial complex of Russian Railways discussed topical issues of implementation of advanced technologies as part of the Digital Railway Station (DRS) project. IEDT JSC is a permanent member of the Chief Engineers Board, and V.V. Kondratenko, Head of the Research Support Department, took part in the last event.
The venue of this meeting was chosen not by accident, for Chelyabinsk-Main station is one of the largest and cutting-edge stations on the railroad network of RZD JSCo where you can see how elements of “Digital Railway Station” complex project are tested and implemented in practice.
IEDT JSC continues to improve and develop new competencies, to be client-oriented and open to changes. At the beginning of the meeting, A.M. Khramtsov Deputy Director General, Chief Engineer of RZD JSCo, emphasized and drew the attention of attendees to the fact that the development of any project, including digital one, should be focused on its cost-effectiveness. In the event of implementation of the DRS project, it is possible to achieve effects with a minimum of two digital stations in a closed domain.
During the event, the participants of the Board visited and got acquainted with the operations of the even yard of the Chelyabinsk-Main station. The parallel automatic breaking-up of two trains using unmanned shunting locomotive control technology was demonstrated. Also, the operation of detaching car by a robot without human involvement was shown over time in the experimental format.
Digitalization can identify “bottlenecks” and improve the efficiency of production processes and traffic safety, as well as eliminate human involvement, primarily, in routine and “likely to cause injury” processes.
The participants of the Chief Engineers Board emphasized the impeccable organization of the event by the host party of the Southern Urals Railway, as well as the Department of Technical Policy, RZD JSCo, despite the long break since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.