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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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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)

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

Substitution in the framework of maintenance

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

Substitution in the framework of maintenance

Vehicles / VA

Application Guide

GUI/LOC&PAS TSI/2021 - version 3.0 on 15/02/2021 Guide for the application of the LOC&PAS TSI (Commission Regulation (EU) No 1302/2014 of 18 November 2014 and amended by the Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/776) In accordance with Article 19(3) of Regulation (EU) 2016/796 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2016

Substrate

International Standard

ISO

ISO 5658-2:2006(en) Reaction to fire tests — Spread of flame — Part 2: Lateral spread on building and transport products in vertical configuration

Subsystem placed in service without an EC declaration of verification

Single Market Mutual Recognition Conformity Assessment

Regulation

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/250 of 12 February 2019 on the templates for EC declarations and certificates for railway interoperability constituents and subsystems, on the model of declaration of conformity to an authorised railway vehicle type and on the EC verification procedures for subsystems in accordance with Directive (EU) 2016/797 of the European Parliament and of the Council and repealing Commission Regulation (EU) No 201/2011

Subsystems

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)

Subsystems

Single Market Mutual Recognition Conformity Assessment

Decision

2010/713/EU: Commission Decision of 9 November 2010 on modules for the procedures for assessment of conformity, suitability for use and EC verification to be used in the technical specifications for interoperability adopted under Directive 2008/57/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council

Subsystems

International Relations

COTIF Document

Uniform Rules concerning the Technical Admission of Railway Material used in International Traffic (ATMF - Appendix G to the Convention) version of 01.11.2023

Subtree

International Standard

ISO

ISO/IEC 10026-1:1998(en) Information technology — Open Systems Interconnection — Distributed Transaction Processing — Part 1: OSI TP Model

Success

SMS Safety Culture Human and Organisational Factor

ISO

ISO 9000:2015(en) Quality management systems — Fundamentals and vocabulary

Latest release

Successive carrier

Withdrawn

Application Guide

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

Latest release

Successive carrier

Withdrawn

Application Guide

TAP TSI Annex B.54 Indirect Fulfilment application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013

Latest release

Successive carrier

Withdrawn

Application Guide

TAP TSI Annex B.55 PRM assistance application_guide - version 1.0 of 06/12/2013

Latest release

Suicide

EU Policy

Glossary

Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026

Latest release

Suicide

Safety / SSC-SA

Directive

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

Super high cube container

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

Super high-cube container

EU Policy

Glossary

Glossary for transport statistics - 6TH EDITION 2026

Latest release

Superior

International Standard

ISO

ISO/IEC 10026-1:1998(en) Information technology — Open Systems Interconnection — Distributed Transaction Processing — Part 1: OSI TP Model

Supervised manoeuvre

ERTMS

Technical Document

ERTMS/ETCS - Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations - version : 4.0.0 - date 05/07/2023

Supervisory authority

Data Protection

Regulation

Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC

Supervisory authority concerned

Data Protection

Regulation

Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC