C-Roads Czech Republic

Description

Czech Republic is one of the founding members of the European C-Roads Platform thanks to its prior experience with the implementation of C-ITS technology. It is specific for the C-Roads Czech Republic project that it does not target only on motorways but also on cities, public transport and railway level crossings. The cities of Brno, Ostrava and Pilsen are among the first European cities where C-ITS has been fully implemented. In the same way, first trams and first railway level crossing signalling systems in Europe were equipped with C-ITS technology as part of the Czech C-Roads pilot.

Motorways

C-ITS Brno agglomeration motorway covers the southern sector of the, in particular parts of motorway D1 and major radial roads that are connecting the outer ring road to the Brno center. Installations were finished in June 2019. C-ITS corridors cover the motorway D5 between Prague and Pilsen incl. the section close to the Czech/German state border. C-ITS corridor furthermore includes the motorway D11 between Prague and Hradec Králové (towards Poland) and the motorway D1 between Prague and Brno and motorway D 52 between Brno and the Czech/Austrian state border (until the completion of the entire motorway section the part of class 1 road is temporarily used). C-ITS services on C-ITS corridors were put into operation in October 2019.

Implemented C-ITS services provide warning messages to drivers about road works, slow and stationary vehicles and hazardous locations or approaching emergency vehicle thus driver can adapt the driving. The Road Works Warning service can also protect the road workers through messages that inform drivers about a work site ahead therefore drivers can drive cautiously along the location. National field tests were carried out and verified the functionality in March 2020.

Cities

The Brno urban road operator has managed to bring together several public & private stakeholders to form a complex C-ITS system which is already being utilized by the public transport vehicles, vehicles of Fire Rescue Services, as well as the urban road operator itself. The deployment was particularly challenging since C-ITS & traffic light technologies of multiple manufacturers were involved, however it has been proven that even so many different actors can create functional and fully interoperable cooperative ITS system.

The cities of Ostrava and Pilsen as pioneers in implementation of C-ITS to public transport vehicles had to find a way on how to get the C-ITS onboard units to trams and trolleybuses which are under special railway regulation. Most of the C-ITS devices on the market did not meet the requirements of such regulations therefore special terms had to be negotiated with the Railway Administration. It is necessary in the future to demand fulfilling these requirements from the C-ITS equipment manufacturers.

Railway level crossings

Implementation and deployment of the RSU and Back-office system for the RLX Use case has been completed, and tailored C-ITS systems, broadcasting the status of a level crossing, were deployed on 2 railway level crossings in September 2019 in the Pardubice region. Additional 2 railway level crossings in the Ústí n. L. region were equipped with C-ITS systems in the 1st half of 2020 followed by testing and evaluation activities. Implementation and deployment of C-ITS on railway level crossings require additional steps – verification and validation of maintaining safety of railway signalling systems. What’s more, accomplishment of RLX use case and messages harmonization among partners and in public standards has also been necessary.

Hybrid system and Personal data protection

The decision to build a fully hybrid system (using two transmission technologies - ITS G5 and mobile operator networks on LTE technology) led us to a unique open architecture of the entire system covered by a dedicated integration platform, which is ready to connect different service providers. This architecture is thus a forerunner of the future European architecture connecting national implementations.

In addition to this architectural success, we have managed to competently address the issue of personal data protection, which is a necessity for the system to be credible for its users. Later European working group confirmed problem that current legislation on personal data protection makes it virtually impossible to build open C-ITS system. The output of the project is a recommendation for the establishment of an international group of experts who will suggest future changes in legislation to allow new transport solutions.

Cross border testing

C-ITS was successfully deployed and has been ready for testing since spring 2020. The cross border testing was coordinated with C-Roads partners and OEMs. Participants in tests were registered in advance so they could get detailed organizational and technical information and additional support. Unfornatelly, given the situation with COVID-19 pandemic the testing event was postponed to the spring 2021.

As described above, in cities like Brno C-ITS is already being utilized by real users. The C- Roads Czech Republic project has aroused the interest of other Czech cities which are now willing to follow the success stories of Brno, Ostrava and Pilsen. Also, the national Road Administration plans to further develop and extend its C-ITS system in order to provide continuos and top-quality services for even more vehicles travelling on its roads. It is the aim of the Czech authorities to further support this interest and to spread C-ITS across the country so that every Czech road user can benefit from the work started by the C-Roads project.

Location Description

The Czech C-Roads pilot sites are located on the Rhine-Danube Core Network Corridor in the section München/Nürnberg – Praha, on the Orient-East Med Core Network Corridor in the section Praha – Brno, and on the urban nodes Plzen, Brno and Ostrava. Plzen and Ostrava are situated on the Rhine-Danube Core Network Corridor. Ostrava and Brno are situated on the Baltic-Adriatic Core Network Corridor. Cooperative system are being deployed on more than 200 km of Core Network Corridors and municipalities network belonging to these motorways (Brno, Plzen).

Implementing Bodies

The services will be implemented by Individual C-Roads Czech Republic project partners:

Implementation of C-ITS services via ITS G5

• Road and motorway Directorate (RSD) of the Czech Republic
• City of Brno (via. Brněnské komunikace)
• Správa železnic, state organization (SŽDC)
• City of Ostrava and Plzeň (via. their public transport companies)
• AŽD Praha

Implementation of hybrid C-ITS system based on ITS G5 and current LTE technologies

• O2 CZ
• INTENS Corporation
• T-Mobile CZ

Implementation of new cellular technologies (LTE-V)

• T-Mobile CZ

Evaluation and Assessment of implemented systems:

• Czech Technical University in Prague, Faculty of Transportation Sciences (CTU)

Schedule

• 2016 – 2017 – development of security protocols and specifications, technical and functional specification according to current standards, public procurement of the C-ITS pilot deployment.
• 2018 – 2019 – deployment of C-ITS, development of procedure for assessment of reliability and safety
• 2019 – 2020 – testing and assessment of the deployed C-ITS services according to the developed procedures in order to evaluate functionality and interoperability and possibly identify reliability and safety issues

Key Performance Indicators

• Motorways covered: 230 km*
• Cities involved: 3
• Urban intersections equipped: 25
• Railway level crossings equipped: 4
• Roadside units in total: 115
• Motorway Maintenance vehicles equipped: 109 
• Advance Warning Trailers equipped: 124
• Trams&busses&trolleybusses equipped: 7 
• Emergency vehicles equipped: 1 fire rescue response vehicle

*covered by ITS-G5

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