The Background
Gear Rail is a leading railway integration service provider headquartered in South Africa. The company operates in sub-Saharan African countries. In its project for the Ghana Railway Development Authority, Gear Rail selected Hytera as its communication system partner to supply a TETRA system to the project.
The project is part of the Government of Ghana’s strategy to develop the country’s railway infrastructure to help improve socio-economic conditions.
The Challenge:
Voice call and data transmission across railway line stretched 100km
The new standard gauge railway is approximately 100km long and it has five stations along the route. The key communication requirements include
providing radio signal coverage around each of the stations. Train in-cab communications also need to be installed to enable voice calls between the train and the stations. The train radios have to support data communications to report train speed, status, and location to stations, signallers, and controllers in real time. The network must be able to transmit voice calls and data simultaneously.
A TETRA two-way radio system was proposed as the solution. TETRA can easily support the voice call side of the requirements, so the biggest challenge is to adapt the network to ensure guaranteed data transmissions from track-to-train and train-to-track. This data transmission is essential for the train control signaling system and, therefore, the safe operation of the railway.
The Solution
Hytera supplied a TETRA digital trunked two-way radio network, which is adapted to support both voice communications and data transmissions. The TETRA system is used as the bearer network to enable the data exchange between the train and the control center.
The customer attaches great importance to data transmission, as the safety of rail operations depends on it. To ensure resilience and redundancy, the customer has two data transmission systems: one utilizing GPRS, and the other based on satellite services. The main reason for deploying two technologies is that the GPRS system cannot provide good coverage along the entire railway line, so the satellite system is used as a backup, but it is not used frequently.
Hytera supplied its TETRA MT680 Plus mobile terminals for the in-cab train radios and for the stations and control center. Rail staff is issued with Hytera TETRA PT580H Plus hand portable radios. Both radios feature Hytera’s advanced noise-canceling technology, so users have excellent audio quality even in noisy railway environments.
The radios are rugged and robust and come with IP67 protection against dust and water ingress, and can cope with the high temperatures experienced in Africa. The radios also feature integrated GPS functionality to enable precise positioning. The hand portables are also equipped with the lone worker, man-down alarm, and emergency alarm features to help keep rail staff safe.
The Benefits
Cost Efficient Solutions
By installing a TETRA network capable of meeting the requirements for voice calls between train staff and data transmissions, the customer avoided having to deploy two separate technologies for voice and for data.
Simpler Network Operations
As well as being a cost-effective solution, deploying a single radio technology
makes the communication system simpler and easier to install, operate and maintain.
Safe Railway Operations
The TETRA network is designed from the outset to deliver mission-critical
communications. It is highly reliable and highly available, which guarantees safe train control operations and enhances the safety of passengers.
