ERA Railway Terminology Collection

Last updated: 10 September 2025

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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Disclaimer
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
Predefined formation(s)	Vehicles / VA	TSI	Commission Regulation (EU) No 1302/2014 of 18 November 2014 concerning a technical specification for interoperability relating to the rolling stock — locomotives and passenger rolling stock subsystem of the rail system in the European Union
Preservation	EU Policy	Decision	Commission Decision (EU) 2021/2121 of 6 July 2020 on records management and archives
Pressure drum	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Pressure receptacle	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Pressure receptacle shell	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Pressure storage	Freight	Glossary	Handbook of scenarios for assessing major chemical accident risks JRC106029 - Ed. 2017
Pressure transport equipment	Freight	Glossary	Handbook of scenarios for assessing major chemical accident risks JRC106029 - Ed. 2017
Pressure vessel systems/pressure equipment	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)
Pressurized gas cartridge	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Presumed successful tenderer	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)
Prevention	Freight	Glossary	Transport of dangerous goods. Risks Management Framework. Framework glossary v. 1.0/2018
Prevention cost approach	EU Policy	Glossary	The Social Costs of Transport - February 1997
Preventive maintenance	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
Previous User	Freight	Agreement	General Contract of Use for wagons (CGU)
Price	Telematics Applications for Passenger	Application Guide	TAP TSI Annex B.51 Tariff application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013
Price	Telematics Applications for Passenger	Application Guide	TAP TSI Annex B.52 Reservation application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013
Pricing	Telematics Applications for Passenger	Application Guide	TAP TSI Annex B.51 Tariff application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013
Primary data	Telematics Applications for Freight	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
Primary data	Telematics Applications for Passenger	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
Principal	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

Certification Scheme
Common Safety Method
Conformity Assessment
Control-Command and Signalling
Data Protection
Energy
Entity in Charge of Maintenance
ERTMS
EU Policy
Freight
Human and Organisational Factor
Infrastructure
International Relations
International Standard
Interoperability
Noise
Operation
Persons with Reduced Mobility
Railway Tunnels
Registers
Regulation
RNE Glossary
Safety / SSC-SA
Sectorial Scheme
Security
SERA_EU Transport
Telematics Applications for Freight
Telematics Applications for Passenger
Vehicles / VA
Withdrawn

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