Climate Change Does Not Wait for Maintenance Windows

This week, ERA published its Rail Resilience to Climate Change report, the first comprehensive assessment of how extreme weather is affecting Europe's railway system and what we need to do about it. As I was reflecting on the findings, one message stood out very clearly. 

For decades, much of railway safety and performance improvement has been built on learning from past events. We investigate, we understand, we improve. It is a model that has served the sector well. 

Climate change challenges this logic. 

The weather patterns that shaped the design, operation and maintenance of our infrastructure are no longer a reliable guide for the future. Floods, storms, heatwaves and landslides are becoming more frequent and more severe across Europe. Railways are already feeling the consequences through service disruptions, infrastructure damage and growing operational challenges. 

Climate change does not wait for maintenance windows. Neither should resilience. 

The question is no longer whether railways will be affected. The question is how prepared we are to anticipate and manage those risks. 

This is why one of the report's most important conclusions is that resilience can no longer rely on reactive responses alone. We need to strengthen our ability to detect emerging risks, understand vulnerabilities and act before disruption becomes damage and damage becomes a safety concern. 

This requires more than local solutions. Weather systems do not stop at borders, and neither should our understanding of climate risks. Better data, common reporting, stronger cooperation between infrastructure managers, national authorities and European bodies, and the integration of climate considerations into safety and risk management processes will all be part of the answer. 

The objective is straightforward: keeping rail safe, reliable and interoperable in a changing climate. 

Europe needs rail more than ever, for mobility, competitiveness, decarbonisation and resilience. Making railways themselves more resilient is therefore not an environmental discussion alone. It is becoming a strategic necessity. 

The publication of this report is not the end of the conversation. It is the starting point for a more systematic European approach to climate resilience in rail. 

Because adapting to climate change is not about predicting every event. It is about ensuring that, whatever the weather brings, the railway remains ready to deliver.

This article is part of On Track with the Director, offering a personal window into the thoughts, insights and experiences of Oana Gherghinescu, Executive Director of ERA.