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ERA Railway Terminology visual v0 featured

ERA Railway Terminology Collection

Last updated: 12 March 2026

The ERA Railway Terminology Collection gathers terms and abbreviations that are contained in the EU legal framework for railway, technical documents produced by bodies which are engaged in the development of important evolution in the railway system and other relevant glossaries.

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The file you will get by clicking the "Download the full Terminology" button below is in CSV format. To convert it to a readable Excel file:

1. Download the CSV file
2. Open a blank Excel sheet
3. Go to Data → Get Data from CSV → select the CSV file you just downloaded
4. The Excel file will be generated (without any encoding issues)

Starting with "F" (240)

ERA Railway Terminology Collection is a consultation tool, developed to support the sharing of information through the actors involved in running the Single European Railway Area (SERA). The responsibility for the correctness, completeness, accuracy, or reliability of the information in ERA RTC lays upon the authors of the definitions, as they derive from reference documents having their own preparation and approval flow. Users cannot call ERA liable for the use they make of the content. Please consider that when the collection is exported (.csv) and then printed or converted, it becomes uncontrolled.
Term Context Document Type Origin document

Forward movement

ERTMS

Technical Document

ERTMS/ETCS - Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations - version : 4.0.0 - date 05/07/2023

Forwarding agent/freight forwarder

Freight

Glossary

Terminology on Combined Transport from Economic Commission for Europe (UN/ECE). Prepared by the UN/ECE, the European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT) and the European Commission (EC). UNITED NATIONS - New York and Geneva, 2001

Fouling point

ERTMS

Technical Document

ERTMS/ETCS - Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations - version : 4.0.0 - date 05/07/2023

Fourth Railway Package

Infrastructure

Glossary

European Rail Infrastructure Managers

FPB

Vehicles / VA

ERA Technical Document

Specifications to perform the assessment of conformity of friction elements for wheel tread brakes (Version 3) Technical document ERA/TD/2013-02/INT Friction elements for wheel tread brakes for freight wagons. V. 3.0, 2015

FprEN

International Standard

EU Technical Document

CEN CENELEC ABBRAVIATION ACRONYM 2025

FR

International Standard

ISO

ISO 3166 (en) - Online Browsing Platform (OBP) Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions — Part 1: Country code

fr

EU Policy

EU Technical Document

Technical document from the Publications Office of the European Union - ‘Style guide’ Coordination Interinstitutional Style Guide - version on 19.04.2022

FRA

EU Policy

EU Technical Document

Technical document from the Publications Office of the European Union - ‘Style guide’ Coordination Interinstitutional Style Guide - version on 19.04.2022

FRACAS

International Standard

ISO

ISO 22163:2023(en) Railway applications — Railway quality management system — ISO 9001:2015 and specific requirements for application in the railway sector

FRACAS

SMS Safety Culture Human and Organisational Factor

ISO

ISO 22163:2023(en) Railway applications — Railway quality management system — ISO 9001:2015 and specific requirements for application in the railway sector

Latest release

Framework agreement

SERA_EU Transport

Directive

Directive 2012/34/EU of the Parliament and of the Council of 21 November 2012 establishing a single European railway area (recast)

Framework agreement

Infrastructure

Glossary

European Rail Infrastructure Managers

Framework agreement (FA)

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Framework capacity

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Framework capacity

Infrastructure

Regulation

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/545 of 7 April 2016 on procedures and criteria concerning framework Agreements for the allocation of rail infrastructure capacity

Framework capacity statement

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Framework capacity statement

Infrastructure

Regulation

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/545 of 7 April 2016 on procedures and criteria concerning framework Agreements for the allocation of rail infrastructure capacity

Framework contract

EU Policy

Regulation

Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 September 2024 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union (recast)

Framework for Capacity Allocation (FCA)

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025