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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Starting with "R" (637)

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
Road freight vehicle	EU Policy	Glossary	Eurostat Transport Glossary on web release November 2024
Road tractor	EU Policy	Glossary	Eurostat Transport Glossary on web release November 2024
Road train	EU Policy	Glossary	Eurostat Transport Glossary on web release November 2024
Road train	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
Road transport type	EU Policy	Glossary	Eurostat Transport Glossary on web release November 2024
Road vehicle	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Road-Rail transport	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
RoLa	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025
Roll away	ERTMS	Technical Document	ERTMS/ETCS - Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations - version : 4.0.0 - date 05/07/2023
Roll cage, roll container, roll pallet	Withdrawn	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
Roll on - roll off	EU Policy	Glossary	Eurostat Transport Glossary on web release November 2024
ROLL-ON-ROLL-OFF (RO-RO)	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
Roll-on/roll-off (ro-ro)	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
Rollback - transaction rollback	International Standard	ISO	ISO/IEC 10026-1:1998(en) Information technology — Open Systems Interconnection — Distributed Transaction Processing — Part 1: OSI TP Model
Roller Unit	Freight	ERA Technical Document	Codification of lines and wagons for combined transport and associated operational procedures Technical document : ERA/TD/2023-01/CCT - Version : 1.1 on 21 March 2023
Rolling highway (RoLa)	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025
Rolling planning	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025
Rolling road	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
Rolling road	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
Rolling stock	Interoperability	Directive	Directive (EU) 2016/797 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2016 on the interoperability of the rail system within the European Union (recast)

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

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