MOSCOW-A Russian railway in the Urals began testing mobile digital radio communications using GSM-R technology and Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) standard to decide whether to use both of them or stick to one technology in future.
The Sverdlovsk railway is testing the combined system on a 153-km long stretch where 16 base stations and a switchboard of each standard have been installed.
Valery Degtyarev, director general of the Proftelecom engineering company that was set up by the Railways Ministry to develop the project said German RodeSchwarz supplied TETRA equipment, while Siemens delivered the equipment for GSM-R technology, which was designed specifically for railway communications. Degtyarev refused to disclose the amount of the deal, but experts estimate both sets of equipment at several million U.S. dollars each.
The network is to provide communications between trains, railway services and control units and is expected to considerably increase transportation efficiency in general.
If the tests are successful, the Railway ministry plans to cover the whole of its immense transportation system with the mobile communications network. The problem however is that most of the 450-470 MHz band, where TETRA operates, is occupied by NMT 450 MHz carriers, while the 890 MHz spectrum necessary for GSM-R has no free room at all in some Russian regions.
