The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications of Estonia, Ministry of Transport of Latvia and Ministry of Transport of Lithuania have approved the Design Guidelines for Rail Baltica, the common design standard mandatory for design, construction and operations of the Rail Baltica infrastructure.
The Design Guidelines manual, prepared by Systra, determines the key requirements and standards for the Rail Baltica railway alignment, track, embankments and earthworks, bridges, overpasses, tunnels and similar structures, energy, control-command signalling system, telecommunications system, SCADA, infrastructure facilities, environmental requirements, BIM, architectural and landscaping requirements, reliability, availability and maintainability and safety (RAMS) requirements, and other elements.
In the process of defining the main design parameters it was examined how to choose the parameters which give more value from the railway infrastructure but is still according to the EU Technical Specifications for Interoperability. Therefore, in comparison to what was planned earlier, it was agreed to increase the maximum design speed for passenger trains up to 249 km/h (the maximum operational speed is 234 km/h), to determine axle load – 25 tonnes and the maximum freight train length – 1050 meters. According to the document, ERTMS – Level 2, Baseline 3 will be implemented.
“The approval of the Design Guidelines for Rail Baltica project was one of the essential milestones for the project implementation and for fulfilling the commitments undertaken under the Grant Agreement signed with INEA. The Design Guidelines Manual is important instrument to use in the design process of the Rail Baltica infrastructure which has just started, “Baiba Rubesa, Chairperson of Management Board, RB Rail, said.
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