Easy to use for all

Rail will deliver an excellent travel experience to regular and occasional passengers thanks to dependable real-time information, innovative payment methods, and improved solutions for accessibility.

Improving the overall experience and accessibility will mean rail is the mode of choice for a much broader range of journeys and is playing an important part in enabling a more inclusive society.

"New knowledge and technical solutions have a key role to play in making the railway passenger centric and easy to use. It is crucial that the rail industry puts passengers’ needs and expectations at its heart." READ MORE

Anthony Smith, Chief Executive, Transport Focus

VIEW THE ROUTEMAP

The functional priority routemaps highlight the steps needed in the next few years to ensure that new technical solutions can underpin progress towards the key goals. You can explore the latest version of the routemap below and also read about progress to date against the stepping stones.

Select the routemap or progress update, then hover over the image to zoom in / out.

Download the Routemap

Routemap

Download the Progress update

Progress update

An interactive version is available to view on desktop

Case studies help the railway to celebrate and publicise its achievements and learn lessons in introducing new solutions. Explore the stories below and share yours at rts@rssb.co.uk.

Southeastern’s Innovative Integrated Approach to Enhancing Customer Information Read more

Highlands and Islands GO-HI app shows how MaaS can benefit rural communities Read more

BriteWay-XR Read more

Serious Games: widening horizons through accessible travel simulations Read more

Assessing the risk of Covid-19 transmission Read more

‘Track my train’: providing customised real-time journey updates Read more

Personalised journey planning and real-time updates in one place with Alert Me Read more

Seat comfort: measure it to improve it Read more

Improving access for all passengers Read more

Real-time personalised journey updates with Passenger Connect Read more

Who is doing what?

Many research and innovation activities support progress towards the goals set out for this priority. Visibility of these is essential to enable greater collaboration and increase the likelihood of success. This is why the RTS puts a spotlight on a selection of these activities, enables you to download the full list of activities of which we are aware, and invites you to add to this picture by sharing your own work.

Assisted Boarding Points - South Western Railway

Dedicated Assisted Boarding Points on SWR station platforms where customers can WhatsApp or call for support from the guard on the next available service with just 10 mins notice.

Inclusive design in rail

A PhD studentship at the University of Birmingham is exploring opportunities to improve and implement inclusive design in the railway.

Dynamic seat comfort for passengers

An RSSB project is developing a seat comfort specification, including parameters assessing comfort for trains in motion, with outputs expected to feed into Key Train Requirements and industry guidance.

Seat reservation system (CloseR)

A retrofittable customer loyalty and dynamic seat reservation system from TrainFX / Unipart Rail uses seat sensors to detect occupancy, offering real-time reservations and seat availability displays

Data to improve the customer experience (DICE)

Led by Loughborough University this explored what personal and contextual data is needed about passengers, to enable transport providers to provide a better service

Good Practice - Wheel Chairs and Mobility Scooters

RSSB Good Practice Guide: Supporting passengers travelling with wheelchairs and mobility scooters.

Accessible Journey Pocket Assistant

Zipabout developed pocket-sized device that can provide highly personalised real-time assistance to any traveller with less visible impairments using rail and bus service.

Accessibility Maturity Assessment Tool

RSSB developed framework to appraise passenger accessibility and inclusion management within railway organisations.

Download the full list

Share what you are working on

Help keep the industry up to date with progress by sharing your research and innovation activities that are relevant to this priority.

Functional Priorities