CLEARSY realizes the formal proof of the Control – Command – Signalling system of the HPMV project.

2 February 2022

CLEARSY realizes the formal proof of the Control – Command – Signalling system of the HPMV project: the new Hybrid ERTMS Level 3 signalling on the Marseille – Ventimiglia line.

Within the framework of the new high performance objectives of SNCF Réseau, the Marseille – Ventimiglia line will be the pilot project for the deployment of Hybrid ERTMS Level 3 on the conventional network. CLEARSY is assisting SNCF Réseau by providing the system safety demonstration, the associated formal proof, and by participating in the second look activities necessary for the system homologation. The project will develop, approve, deploy, implement and test the functional principles, operating and maintenance procedures, and then apply them to other lines of the RFN.

With 35 million passengers in 2018, and 40 million expected by 2030, the Côte d’Azur network is the busiest in France outside of the Paris region. The current equipment: old generation signal lights and signal boxes, are not adapted to future mobility needs. It is therefore planned to digitalize the entire signaling and operating system of the line.

The challenge of the AZUR+ project is therefore immense: it will implement Hybrid ERTMS level 3 for the first time in France – and in Europe, on a conventional line, without any other signalling, without any cohabitation phase between the old and the new system, on a line in dense operation that it will only be possible to close down to carry out the migration for a very short time.

The aim of the proof of correct interoperability is to demonstrate irrefutably that the Control-Command-Signaling system meets its safety requirements, based on the guarantees expected from the various subsystems:

  • New PAI NG – ARGOS interlocking in the lead phase;
  • New RBC (Radio Block Center, the train control automatisms) with a prior development;
  • MISTRAL NG (interlocking) in the process of deploying the first serial heads;
  • The use of the axle counter (new generation);
  • The high-performance migration of the GSM-R media;
  • A optical fiber telecommunication network architecture with high resilience redundancy.

This activity will be a complementary and determining element of the evidence to be produced by the HPMV Project for the certification by the organization in charge of the qualification and will allow an agreement of the EPSF (French Railway Safety Authority) on the direct switchover between the two railway signaling worlds.

A first geographical batch between Cannes and the Italian border will be put into service at the end of 2027.