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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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 (RU)	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025
Railway Undertaking (RU)	Withdrawn	TSI	Commission Regulation (EU) No 1305/2014 of 11 December 2014 on the technical specification for interoperability relating to the telematics applications for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
Railway Undertaking Advisory Group (RAG)	RNE Glossary	Glossary	RNE Glossary - NS_CID_Glossary_2025
Railway vehicle	Vehicles / VA	ERA Technical Document	Application Guide for Vehicle Keeper Marking Code (VKM) Register - v. 1.2 on 01.04.2014
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	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
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 or rail vehicle	International Standard	ISO	ISO/DIS 22575(en) Railway applications — General terms and definitions
Railway vehicle trip	EU Policy	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
Railways capital stock	Withdrawn	Glossary	Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026	Latest release
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	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
RAM	SMS Safety Culture Human and Organisational Factor	ISO	ISO 22163:2023(en) Railway applications — Railway quality management system — ISO 9001:2015 and specific requirements for application in the railway sector	Latest release
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
RAM(S)	ERTMS	Technical Document	ERTMS/ETCS - Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations - version : 4.0.0 - date 05/07/2023
RAMS	Control-Command and Signalling	Application Guide	GUI/CCS TSI/2023 Version 1.0 17/06/2024 Guide for the application of the CCS TSI 2023/1695 In accordance with Article 19(3) of Regulation (EU) 2016/796 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2016
RAMS	Control-Command and Signalling	ERA Technical Document	Guideline - Certification: Restrictions and added functions V1.0 of 18.06.2024
RAMS	SMS Safety Culture Human and Organisational Factor	ISO	ISO 22163:2023(en) Railway applications — Railway quality management system — ISO 9001:2015 and specific requirements for application in the railway sector	Latest release
RAMS	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

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

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