ERA Railway Terminology Collection

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.

Click here for more information

Latest update: 1 May 2025

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)

Download the full Terminology

Filter by context

Filter by document type

Filter by latest release

Sort by

Items per page

Starting with "R" (513)

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
Railway undertaking	EU Policy	Regulation	Regulation (EU) 2018/643 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics
Railway undertaking	SERA_EU Transport	Regulation	Regulation (EU) 2021/782 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2021 on rail passengers’ rights and obligations (recast)
Railway undertaking	Common Safety Method	Application Guide	Safety management system requirements for safety certification or safety authorisation. Version 1.3 Manuscript completed in April 2021
Railway Undertaking	Freight	Agreement	General Contract of Use for wagons (CGU)
Railway Undertaking (RU)	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
Railway Undertaking (RU)	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2023
Railway Undertaking Advisory Group (RAG)	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2023
Railway vehicle	International Relations	Convention	Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) Appendix C – Regulations concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Rail (RID)
Railway vehicle	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 5TH EDITION 2019
Railway vehicle	EU Policy	Regulation	Regulation (EU) 2018/643 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics
Railway vehicle journey	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 5TH EDITION 2019
Railways capital stock	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 5TH EDITION 2019
Railway infrastructure	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Railway operation	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Railway system	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Railway track	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Railway vehicle or rail vehicle	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Rain	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)
Rain-out	Freight	Glossary	Handbook of scenarios for assessing major chemical accident risks JRC106029 - Ed. 2017
RAM	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

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

Agreement
Application Guide
Certification Scheme
CIT Document
Convention
COTIF Document
Council Recommendation
Decision
Directive
ERA Technical Document
EU Technical Document
Glossary
Guide
International Agreement
ISO
Manual
Recommendation
Regulation
Sectorial Scheme
Technical Document
TSI
Website