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ERA Railway Terminology visual v0 featured

ERA Railway Terminology Collection

Last updated: 5 December 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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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 "P" (431)

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

Passenger train

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

Passenger train-km

Common Safety Method

Decision

2009/460/EC: Commission Decision of 5 June 2009 on the adoption of a common safety method for assessment of achievement of safety targets, as referred to in Article 6 of Directive 2004/49/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (notified under document number C(2009) 4246)

Passenger type

Telematics Applications for Passenger

Application Guide

TAP TSI Annex B.52 Reservation application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013

Passenger type

Telematics Applications for Passenger

Application Guide

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

Passenger type

Telematics Applications for Passenger

Application Guide

TAP TSI Annex B.51 Tariff application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013

Passenger-kilometre

EU Policy

Glossary

Eurostat Transport Glossary on web

Passenger-km

Safety / SSC-SA

Directive

Directive (EU) 2016/798 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2016 on railway safety (recast)

Passenger-km

EU Policy

Regulation

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

Passenger-related items

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)

Passing Point

ERTMS

Glossary

ERTMS/ATO Glossary - version 2 on 05.07.2023

Passive level crossing

EU Policy

Glossary

Glossary for transport statistics - 5TH EDITION 2019

Passive level crossing

Safety / SSC-SA

Directive

Directive (EU) 2016/798 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2016 on railway safety (recast)

Passive provision

Infrastructure

TSI

Commission Regulation (EU) No 1299/2014 of 18 November 2014 on the technical specifications for interoperability relating to the ‘infrastructure’ subsystem of the rail system in the European Union

Passive safety

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)

Path

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

Path

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Latest release

Path

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

Path alteration

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Latest release

Path assembly

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

Path Coordination System (PCS)

RNE Glossary

Glossary

RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025

Latest release