The TimeTable Expert Group (TTEG) meeting was held on 21 and 22 October 2014 at the invitation of CFR Călători, the Romanian Passenger Railway Undertaking, in Bucharest.
26 participants representing 12 railway companies were present.
UIC was represented by Marc Guigon, Senior Advisor for Passenger Transport, Fabrice Setta, Senior Advisor for eBusiness and Joachim Baars, consultant for UIC.
CFR Călători was represented by Adrian Vlaicu, Operational Director of CFR Călători, Irina Vlad, Head of the International and Institutional Affairs Department of CFR Călători, Aurelia Carapcea and Cristina Frigioiu.
The TTEG is a community of Railway Undertakings that publishes consolidated timetable data to be used in information systems to support journey planners and booking activities.
The agenda focused on technical matters, with the meeting being divided into two parts.
On the afternoon of 21 October, Mr Adrian Vlaicu, the Operational Director of CFR Călători, said that they were very pleased to host the meeting which is one of the most important meetings on passenger matters in Europe.
He presented his company CFR Călători and the projects concerning the developments along European corridors IV and IX. CFR plans to increase line speeds along some links up to 160 km/h (Bucharest-Constanta).
Marc Guigon welcomed the latest MERITS members who attended the meeting: RZD (Russia), BC (Belarus), UZ (Ukraine). He underlined the fact that TTEG has to provide technical advice on decisions taken during the Commercial and Distribution Forum (6 November 2014).
Joachim Baars spoke about feedback on data integration and the current problems to be solved.
On 22 October, Frank Martini, project leader at HaCon, presented the latest release of MERITS tool: 4.4.
Many improvements have been implemented concerning the user interface, new functions and integration.
Further changes are planned for next year.
Fabrice Setta spoke about the Minimum Connecting Time, the MERITS code updates and Ecopassenger, which is a website comparing the use of energy and CO2 emissions between rail, road and air.
Dominique Margottin from Railsolutions gave an update of the status of TAP-TSI and FSM (Full Service Model).
Henrik Nyman, from Linkon, presented the ways to sell IRT tickets in Linkon’s system (Sweden). He supported the idea to introduce a new information concerning Minimum Connecting Time giving the example of the railway station of Copenhagen.
