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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 "M" (399)

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

MEP

International Standard

EU Technical Document

CEN CENELEC ABBRAVIATION ACRONYM 2025

Mercosur

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

Message

ERTMS

Technical Document

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

Message Authentication Code (MAC)

ERTMS

Technical Document

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

Meta station

Telematics Applications for Passenger and Freight Services

TSI

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/253 of 6 February 2026 on a technical specification relating to the telematics subsystem of the rail system in the European Union for interoperability of data sharing in rail transport (TEL TSI) and repealing Regulations (EU) No 454/2011 (TAP TSI) and (EU) No 1305/2014 (TAF TSI)

Latest release

Metadata

EU Policy

Decision

Commission Decision (EU) 2021/2121 of 6 July 2020 on records management and archives

Metadata

Withdrawn

TSI

Commission Regulation (EU) No 1305/2014 of 11 December 2014 on the technical specification for interoperability relating to the telematics applications for freight subsystem of the rail system in the European Union and repealing the Regulation (EC) No 62/2006

Latest release

Metadata

Withdrawn

TSI

Commission Regulation (EU) No 454/2011 of 5 May 2011 on the technical specification for interoperability relating to the subsystem ‘telematics applications for passenger services’ of the trans-European rail system

Latest release

Metadata

Telematics Applications for Passenger and Freight Services

TSI

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/253 of 6 February 2026 on a technical specification relating to the telematics subsystem of the rail system in the European Union for interoperability of data sharing in rail transport (TEL TSI) and repealing Regulations (EU) No 454/2011 (TAP TSI) and (EU) No 1305/2014 (TAF TSI)

Latest release

Metadata

Telematics Applications for Passenger and Freight Services

Regulation

Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2017/1926 of 31 May 2017 supplementing Directive 2010/40/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council with regard to the provision of EU-wide multimodal travel information services

Latest release

Metadata

Telematics Applications for Passenger and Freight Services

Regulation

Regulation (EU) 2023/2854 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 December 2023 on harmonised rules on fair access to and use of data and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/2394 and Directive (EU) 2020/1828

Latest release

Metal and inductive components-free space between wheels

Interoperability

Decision

Commission Decision of 30 November 2009 on the reference document referred to in Article 27(4) of Directive 2008/57/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the interoperability of the rail system within the Community. (2009/965/EC)

Metal hydride storage system

International Relations

Convention

Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)

Metal IBC

International Relations

Convention

Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)

Metal mass of a vehicle

Interoperability

Decision

Commission Decision of 30 November 2009 on the reference document referred to in Article 27(4) of Directive 2008/57/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the interoperability of the rail system within the Community. (2009/965/EC)

Metastation

Withdrawn

Application Guide

TAP TSI Annex B.50 Timetable application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013

Latest release

Method of implementation

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)

Metro (also known as ‘subway’, ‘metropolitan railway’ or ‘underground’)

EU Policy

Regulation

Regulation (EU) 2018/643 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics

Metro line

EU Policy

Glossary

Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026

Latest release

Metro system

International Standard

ISO

ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions