ETCS expansion: Digital Masterplan

Exactly how ETCS will be expanded, from its initial application as East Coast South, is part of the work of the Industry Partnership for Digital Railway (IPDR).

A ‘Digital Masterplan’ will be published in the new year. Details are under wraps, but NR’s IPDR Director Toufik Machnouk says the plan will “allow us to go from the ECML to the Midland Main Line, the Brighton line, the trans-Pennine route to the North West, and beyond”.

Crucially, the plan features an “integrated industry and portfolio approach” of investment cases which, with the support of the Department for Transport and the rail regulator, will be “funded as one in a strategic business plan for the first time in decades”.

Created by Network Rail in 2021, IPDR has a strategic approach as an ‘open boundary, user-focused, pan-industry organisation’ that Machnouk said “recognises that the viability of a national strategy is fundamentally underpinned by building the capability and experience through delivery”.