Pub­lic trans­port terms clear­ly ex­plained

Con­nec­tion se­cu­ri­ty

When a pas­sen­ger trans­fers, the con­nect­ing ve­hi­cle waits if the de­lay is with­in a de­fined range. The sys­tem au­to­mat­i­cal­ly de­cides based on de­fined rules whether a con­nec­tion is held or aban­doned.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form cal­cu­lates con­nec­tion hold­ing times in real-time and au­to­mat­i­cal­ly com­mu­ni­cates the de­ci­sion to the wait­ing ve­hi­cle. Dis­patch­ers re­tain con­trol but are re­lieved from rou­tine de­ci­sions.

Pub­lic trans­port au­thor­i­ty

The pub­lic en­ti­ty re­spon­si­ble for or­ga­niz­ing and fi­nanc­ing pub­lic trans­port in a re­gion: dis­trict, city, or trans­port as­so­ci­a­tion. Pub­lic trans­port au­thor­i­ties or­der trans­port ser­vices, de­fine qual­i­ty stan­dards, and mon­i­tor com­pli­ance.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form of­fers pub­lic trans­port au­thor­i­ties au­to­mat­ed qual­i­ty mea­sure­ment, KPI dash­boards, and con­tract-com­pli­ant re­ports. Cur­rent­ly in use by RMV, BAV Switzer­land, and VVS Stuttgart, among oth­ers.

Ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty in pub­lic trans­port

All in­di­vid­u­als can in­de­pen­dent­ly use pub­lic trans­port, re­gard­less of phys­i­cal, sen­so­ry, or cog­ni­tive im­pair­ments. The Pas­sen­ger Trans­port Act re­quires com­plete ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty by 2026, in­clud­ing in dig­i­tal pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form sup­ports dig­i­tal ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty with high-con­trast dis­plays, au­di­ble an­nounce­ments, WCAG-com­pli­ant con­tent, and in­for­ma­tion about ac­ces­si­ble board­ing op­tions, all man­aged from one sys­tem.

Bonus-malus reg­u­la­tion

A con­tract mod­el be­tween pub­lic trans­port au­thor­i­ties and trans­port com­pa­nies: If agreed qual­i­ty is ex­ceed­ed, a bonus is giv­en. If it is not met, a malus fol­lows. The mod­el only works if the un­der­ly­ing data is re­li­able and trace­able.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form au­to­mat­i­cal­ly cal­cu­lates bonus-malus val­ues based on val­i­dat­ed real-time data. Pub­lic trans­port au­thor­i­ties and trans­port com­pa­nies ac­cess the same data ba­sis, elim­i­nat­ing dis­cus­sions about data qual­i­ty.

Com­mon In­ter­face (CI)

A stan­dard­ized in­ter­face for data ex­change be­tween rail­way un­der­tak­ings and in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tors in Eu­ro­pean rail trans­port, un­der TAP TSI. Through the CI, real-time po­si­tion, fore­casts, and track data flow. The al­ter­na­tive would be in­di­vid­ual con­nec­tions to each in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tor in each coun­try.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form pro­vides the Com­mon In­ter­face and han­dles TAP-TSI-com­pli­ant data trans­mis­sion, en­abling rail­way un­der­tak­ings to con­nect Eu­rope-wide with a sin­gle in­te­gra­tion.

DAISY (Dy­nam­ic In­for­ma­tion and Re­port­ing Sys­tem)

The term for dy­nam­ic pas­sen­ger dis­plays at stops and sta­tions in Berlin's pub­lic trans­port, the or­ange LED boards with real-time de­par­tures. The tech­nol­o­gy has ex­ist­ed for over 30 years and must be in­te­grat­ed into mod­ern sys­tem land­scapes.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form is open enough to seam­less­ly in­ter­face with old­er hard­ware like DAISY dis­plays and sup­ply them with cur­rent real-time data, with­out cost­ly new ac­qui­si­tions.

Data hub

A cen­tral plat­form that re­ceives data from var­i­ous sources, in­te­grates it, and re­dis­trib­utes it to all con­nect­ed sys­tems. With­out it, each sys­tem must be con­nect­ed in­di­vid­u­al­ly, lead­ing to ex­po­nen­tial­ly in­creas­ing ef­fort.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form it­self acts as a data hub and si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly con­nects ex­ter­nal data hubs at the state and net­work lev­els. Real-time data is stan­dard­ized and sup­plied to in­for­ma­tion sys­tems, dis­plays, and apps.

Dy­nam­ic pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion (DFI)

Elec­tron­ic dis­plays at stops and sta­tions that show when the next ve­hi­cle ar­rives in real-time. Un­like sta­t­ic timetable posters, they con­tin­u­ous­ly up­date and can ad­di­tion­al­ly dis­play dis­rup­tion re­ports, trans­fer rec­om­men­da­tions, and load in­for­ma­tion.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form con­trols DFI dis­plays via stan­dard­ized in­ter­faces and sup­plies them with real-time fore­casts, dis­rup­tion re­ports, and con­nec­tion in­for­ma­tion from a cen­tral data source.

Dis­patch­ing

The op­er­a­tional con­trol of op­er­a­tions in real-time. Dis­patch­ers in the con­trol cen­ter re­spond to dis­rup­tions, plan de­tours, de­ploy re­place­ment ve­hi­cles, and co­or­di­nate op­er­a­tions to pre­vent small de­vi­a­tions from be­com­ing ma­jor is­sues.

In the ETC plat­form: The dis­patch­ing work­sta­tion of the ETC plat­form pro­vides dis­patch­ers with real-time overviews, au­to­mat­ed ac­tion sug­ges­tions, and dig­i­tal tools for faster re­sponse times with less man­u­al in­ter­ven­tion.

Real-time data

In­for­ma­tion that is cap­tured, trans­mit­ted, and dis­played with min­i­mal de­lay: cur­rent ve­hi­cle po­si­tion, de­lay, load. Real-time data comes from GPS, in­fra­struc­ture sen­sors, and on­board com­put­ers and forms the ba­sis for pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, con­nec­tion se­cu­ri­ty, and op­er­a­tions con­trol.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form col­lects real-time data from all con­nect­ed ve­hi­cles, au­to­mat­i­cal­ly val­i­dates it, and dis­trib­utes it si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly to the con­trol cen­ter, pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, and re­port­ing.

Rail­way in­fra­struc­ture com­pa­ny (EIU)

The op­er­a­tor of rail­way in­fra­struc­ture: tracks, switch­es, sig­nals, sta­tions. In Ger­many, pri­mar­i­ly DB In­fra­GO. EIUs plan routes, co­or­di­nate train traf­fic, and re­quire ac­cu­rate data on train com­po­si­tions, de­lays, and route load to do so.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form pro­vides all rel­e­vant data to EIUs via stan­dard­ized in­ter­faces: real-time po­si­tions, PTCM, fore­casts, and UIC telegrams. Trans­port com­pa­nies ful­fill their re­port­ing oblig­a­tions au­to­mat­i­cal­ly.

Pub­lic ad­dress sys­tem (ELA)

Loud­speak­er and an­nounce­ment sys­tems in sta­tions and ve­hi­cles. Through ELA, stop an­nounce­ments, dis­rup­tion re­ports, and safe­ty no­tices are acousti­cal­ly broad­cast. A cen­tral com­po­nent of ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty, it also reach­es peo­ple with vi­su­al im­pair­ments or dis­tract­ed pas­sen­gers.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form di­rect­ly links ELA sys­tems to the con­trol cen­ter. Dis­rup­tion re­ports are au­to­mat­i­cal­ly broad­cast as an­nounce­ments at the af­fect­ed sta­tions and in ve­hi­cles.

In­ci­dent man­age­ment (dis­rup­tion man­age­ment)

All process­es and tools that trans­port com­pa­nies use to re­spond to un­planned op­er­a­tional events: switch fail­ure, ve­hi­cle break­down, large events. Every minute counts, as pas­sen­gers need to be in­formed, ve­hi­cles rerout­ed, and al­ter­na­tives com­mu­ni­cat­ed.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form al­lows dis­rup­tion re­ports to be broad­cast across all chan­nels si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly with a sin­gle click: dis­plays, an­nounce­ments, app, so­cial me­dia. What used to take 30 min­utes now works in sec­onds.

Eu­ro­pean Train Con­trol Sys­tem (ETCS)

The Eu­ro­pean train pro­tec­tion sys­tem and a core com­po­nent of ERTMS. ETCS re­places the more than 20 na­tion­al train pro­tec­tion sys­tems in Eu­rope with a sin­gle stan­dard. It con­tin­u­ous­ly mon­i­tors the speed and po­si­tion of a train and in­ter­venes au­to­mat­i­cal­ly if nec­es­sary. In Ger­many, ETCS is be­ing rolled out ex­ten­sive­ly as part of the "Dig­i­tal Rail Ger­many" ini­tia­tive.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form is not part of the ETCS safe­ty sys­tem, but a cen­tral com­po­nent in the ecosys­tem of ETCS-ca­pa­ble ve­hi­cles. In ETCS retro­fits or re­place­ment fleets, it takes over op­er­a­tional in­te­gra­tion: pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, real-time data, and con­trol cen­ter con­nec­tion work from day one – re­gard­less of whether the ve­hi­cle is on ETCS or con­ven­tion­al routes.

EVU (Rail­way Op­er­at­ing Com­pa­ny)

A com­pa­ny that pro­vides rail­way trans­port ser­vices and al­lows trains to run on the net­work of an in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tor. In Ger­many, there are over 100 pri­vate EVUs in ad­di­tion to Deutsche Bahn, serv­ing a large part of the re­gion­al trans­port.

In the ETC plat­form: 98% of Ger­man pri­vate rail­way op­er­at­ing com­pa­nies use the ETC plat­form. Es­pe­cial­ly for small­er EVUs, the stan­dard­ized so­lu­tion is cru­cial: PTCM trans­mis­sion, real-time data de­liv­ery, and qual­i­ty re­port­ing are stream­lined and au­to­mat­ed.

Pas­sen­ger In­for­ma­tion Sys­tem (FIS)

All ways trav­el­ers are in­formed about pub­lic trans­port: dy­nam­ic dis­plays on the plat­form, an­nounce­ments in the ve­hi­cle, app no­ti­fi­ca­tions, so­cial me­dia, and web­sites. FGI is legal­ly reg­u­lat­ed and a cru­cial fac­tor for pas­sen­ger trust.

In the ETC plat­form: The pas­sen­ger lev­el of the ETC plat­form serves all FGI chan­nels from a sin­gle source: on­board TFT, sta­tion in­di­ca­tors, DB RIS, http://bahn.de , Google Maps, and so­cial me­dia. A click in the con­trol cen­ter, and the in­for­ma­tion is every­where.

Ve­hi­cle Man­u­fac­tur­er

Com­pa­nies that de­vel­op and build ve­hi­cles for pub­lic trans­port, such as train sets, lo­co­mo­tives, bus­es, or trams, in­clud­ing the on­board sys­tems in­stalled (in­fo­tain­ment, di­ag­nos­tics, con­trol tech­nol­o­gy). They must equip ve­hi­cles so that they in­te­grate seam­less­ly into the con­trol cen­ter and IT sys­tems of the op­er­at­ing trans­porta­tion com­pa­nies.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form pro­vides a stan­dard­ized mid­dle­ware be­tween ve­hi­cle and con­trol cen­ter. Ve­hi­cle man­u­fac­tur­ers con­nect their on­board sys­tems to the plat­form once and can then serve mul­ti­ple op­er­a­tors – in­clud­ing pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, di­ag­nos­tic data, and stan­dard­ized in­ter­faces.

Train For­ma­tion Data

De­scribe the struc­ture of a train: wag­ons, lo­co­mo­tives, se­quence, po­si­tion of 1st class, din­ing car, bar­ri­er-free en­try. Ba­sis for pre­cise car po­si­tion dis­plays. With VDV 454 ver­sion 3.1 and PTCM stan­dard­ized for the first time and ex­change­able in real-time.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form cen­tral­ly man­ages train for­ma­tion data and trans­mits them via VDV 454 and PTCM to in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tors and in­for­ma­tion sys­tems. Pas­sen­gers re­ceive cor­rect car po­si­tion in­for­ma­tion in real-time.

In­ter­op­er­abil­i­ty

The abil­i­ty of dif­fer­ent sys­tems, plat­forms, and tech­nolo­gies to work seam­less­ly to­geth­er, even if they come from dif­fer­ent man­u­fac­tur­ers or are op­er­at­ed in dif­fer­ent coun­tries. In pub­lic trans­port, the pre­req­ui­site for data to flow be­tween trans­porta­tion com­pa­nies, con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties, and in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tors.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form is de­signed for in­ter­op­er­abil­i­ty: open stan­dards (VDV, railM­L®, GTFS, SIRI, UIC), stan­dard­ized APIs, and an in­te­gra­tion lay­er that con­nects ex­ist­ing sys­tems as well as new tech­nolo­gies.

ITCS (In­ter­modal Trans­port Con­trol Sys­tem)

A com­put­er-based op­er­a­tions con­trol sys­tem and the dig­i­tal heart of every con­trol cen­ter. It mon­i­tors in real-time where bus­es, trains, or fer­ries are and whether they are op­er­at­ing on sched­ule.

In the ETC plat­form: The op­er­a­tional lev­el of the ETC plat­form maps a com­plete ITCS: con­trol cen­ter work­sta­tion, real-time traf­fic overview, dis­po­si­tion tools, and au­to­mat­ic fore­casts in one sys­tem.

Mu­nic­i­pal Pub­lic Trans­port Com­pa­ny

A trans­port com­pa­ny un­der mu­nic­i­pal or ma­jor­i­ty mu­nic­i­pal own­er­ship, op­er­at­ing bus, tram, or sub­way ser­vices in a city or re­gion. Mu­nic­i­pal op­er­a­tions are re­spon­si­ble for dai­ly op­er­a­tions, pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, lo­cal in­fra­struc­ture, and main­tain di­rect com­mu­ni­ca­tion with cit­i­zens and pol­i­tics.

In the ETC plat­form: Mu­nic­i­pal pub­lic trans­port com­pa­nies use the ETC plat­form as a cen­tral data hub for their mul­ti­modal net­works: con­trol cen­ter, ve­hi­cles, pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, stop man­age­ment, and re­port­ing ac­cess a com­mon data base. This al­lows op­er­a­tions, in­for­ma­tion, and qual­i­ty to be man­aged trans­par­ent­ly and proven to con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties.

Over-the-Air Up­date (OTA)

Soft­ware or data is wire­less­ly trans­ferred to de­vices in the ve­hi­cle via mo­bile or WLAN. No tech­ni­cian on-site, no work­shop vis­it. Ide­al for short-term changes like re­nam­ing stops, line route ad­just­ments, or dis­rup­tion re­ports.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form dis­trib­utes timetable data, an­nounce­ment files, and route topolo­gies via OTA to the en­tire fleet. Changes are cen­tral­ly en­tered once and au­to­mat­i­cal­ly trans­ferred to all on­board com­put­ers, in­di­ca­tors, and an­nounce­ment sys­tems.

Pearl Neck­lace Rep­re­sen­ta­tion

A graph­i­cal rep­re­sen­ta­tion of the stops on a line as a chain of points. It shows the pas­sen­ger at a glance where they are and which stops are still to come. The pearl neck­lace is the stan­dard of on­board pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, known from ICE and sub­way.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form au­to­mat­i­cal­ly gen­er­ates the pearl neck­lace rep­re­sen­ta­tion for on­board TFT dis­plays from the timetable and route data, VDV 713-com­pli­ant and in­di­vid­u­al­ly adapt­able for each op­er­a­tor.

Fore­cast Cal­cu­la­tion

The ad­vance cal­cu­la­tion of when a ve­hi­cle ac­tu­al­ly ar­rives at a stop, based on cur­rent po­si­tion, speed, known stop times, and traf­fic sit­u­a­tion. Ad­vanced sys­tems learn from his­tor­i­cal data and con­sid­er week­days, weath­er, and ma­jor events.

In the ETC plat­form: The fore­cast cal­cu­la­tion of the ETC plat­form uses big data ap­proach­es and AI al­go­rithms to pre­dict ar­rival times with grow­ing ac­cu­ra­cy. The re­sults flow di­rect­ly into pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion and dis­po­si­tion de­ci­sions.

PTCM (Pas­sen­ger Train Com­po­si­tion Mes­sage)

A stan­dard­ized mes­sage about the train com­po­si­tion: wag­ons, lo­co­mo­tives, po­si­tion of 1st class, bi­cy­cle area, bar­ri­er-free en­try. From De­cem­ber 2025, the PTCM trans­mis­sion to DB In­fra­GO is manda­to­ry for all EVUs.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form au­to­mat­i­cal­ly gen­er­ates and trans­mits PTCM data from the avail­able ve­hi­cle and ro­ta­tion data. Trans­port com­pa­nies thus ful­fill the le­gal oblig­a­tion with­out ad­di­tion­al man­u­al ef­fort.

QMS (Qual­i­ty Man­age­ment Sys­tem)

A sys­tem­at­ic ap­proach to mea­sure, eval­u­ate, and im­prove the qual­i­ty of trans­port ser­vices: punc­tu­al­i­ty, can­cel­la­tion rate, cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion. Con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties de­mand QMS data for bonus-malus reg­u­la­tions in trans­port con­tracts.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form re­places man­u­al Ex­cel re­ports with au­to­mat­ed, stan­dard­ized qual­i­ty re­ports. The data is cap­tured di­rect­ly from op­er­a­tions and pro­vides a com­mon, rec­og­nized ba­sis for con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties and trans­port com­pa­nies.

Sin­gle Point of Truth

All in­for­ma­tion comes from a sin­gle, cen­tral source. No con­tra­dic­to­ry data, no par­al­lel Ex­cel lists. Par­tic­u­lar­ly im­por­tant in pub­lic trans­port be­cause many stake­hold­ers work with the same data: con­trol cen­ter, work­shop, pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, man­age­ment.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form is de­signed as a cen­tral data hub. Timetable data, real-time data, and op­er­a­tional in­for­ma­tion are record­ed once and are im­me­di­ate­ly avail­able to all con­nect­ed sys­tems and users.

Tar­get-Ac­tu­al Com­par­i­son

The com­par­i­son be­tween the planned sched­ule (Tar­get) and ac­tu­al op­er­a­tions (Ac­tu­al). Where does the op­er­a­tion de­vi­ate? Which lines are punc­tu­al? Ba­sis for qual­i­ty re­ports, bonus-malus reg­u­la­tions, and in­formed man­age­ment de­ci­sions.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form vi­su­al­izes tar­get-ac­tu­al de­vi­a­tions live on maps and timetable charts. Sub­se­quent­ly, the data is au­to­mat­i­cal­ly pre­pared for con­tract-com­pli­ant re­ports, with­out man­u­al com­pi­la­tion in Ex­cel.

TAP TSI (Telem­at­ic Ap­pli­ca­tions for Pas­sen­ger Ser­vices)

A EU reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work that stan­dard­izes dig­i­tal data ex­change in Eu­ro­pean rail trans­port. Trains cross bor­ders, and TAP TSI en­sures that timeta­bles, real-time data, and train com­po­si­tions are in­ter­change­able across Eu­rope.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form sup­ports TAP TSI-com­pli­ant in­ter­faces, al­low­ing rail­way com­pa­nies to trans­mit data in com­pli­ance with reg­u­la­tions to Eu­ro­pean in­fra­struc­ture op­er­a­tors, with­out lat­er retro­fitting.

Ve­hi­cle Sched­ul­ing

De­ter­mines which ve­hi­cle per­forms which trips on a giv­en day. A sched­ule de­scribes the en­tire dai­ly rou­tine of a ve­hi­cle, from leav­ing the de­pot through all trips to re­turn­ing. Ef­fi­cient sched­ul­ing saves costs through few­er emp­ty runs and bet­ter ve­hi­cle uti­liza­tion.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form im­ports sched­ul­ing data from com­mon plan­ning sys­tems and uses it as a ba­sis for real-time dis­patch, ve­hi­cle al­lo­ca­tion, and en­er­gy con­sump­tion fore­cast­ing.

Pub­lic Trans­port Op­er­a­tor

The com­pa­ny that ac­tu­al­ly op­er­ates pub­lic trans­port: bus­es, trains, trams, or fer­ries. PTOs keep op­er­a­tions run­ning, must meet qual­i­ty re­quire­ments of con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties, and work eco­nom­i­cal­ly at the same time.

In the ETC plat­form: Over 120 pub­lic trans­port op­er­a­tors in 7 coun­tries use the ETC plat­form for op­er­a­tional con­trol, pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion, and au­to­mat­ed re­port­ing to their con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties.

VDV 453 / VDV 454

In­ter­face stan­dards of the As­so­ci­a­tion of Ger­man Trans­port Com­pa­nies. They reg­u­late how op­er­a­tional data and pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion are ex­changed be­tween sys­tems, for ex­am­ple, be­tween con­trol sys­tems and in­for­ma­tion plat­forms. The cur­rent ver­sion 3.1 also al­lows for the trans­mis­sion of for­ma­tion data for the first time.

In the ETC plat­form: The ETC plat­form na­tive­ly sup­ports VDV 453 and 454. Through these in­ter­faces, it pro­vides real-time data to in­for­ma­tion sys­tems, con­tract­ing au­thor­i­ties, and data hubs, with­out ad­di­tion­al con­fig­u­ra­tion ef­fort.

VDV 713

A stan­dard for vi­su­al pas­sen­ger in­for­ma­tion in ve­hi­cles. It de­fines how con­tent is dis­played on mon­i­tors: bead string, line sym­bols, trans­fer hints. Uni­for­mi­ty across all modes of trans­port, so pas­sen­gers can find their way im­me­di­ate­ly.

In the ETC plat­form: The on-board in­fo­tain­ment sys­tems of the ETC plat­form ful­ly im­ple­ment VDV 713 and are si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly open enough to ac­com­mo­date in­di­vid­ual de­sign pref­er­ences of the op­er­a­tors.