Revision of Railway Act Assures Access to EU Rail Network-EU RAIL Agency

On 22 Febru­a­ry 2023, the Federal Coun­cil issued its mes­sa­ge on the revi­si­on of the Rail­ways Act (RTA) with a view to imple­men­ting the tech­ni­cal pil­lar of the EU’s 4th rail­way packa­ge (4th FP (VT)). We con­si­der the draft revi­si­on to be a suc­cess, as it makes pos­si­ble the next steps in har­mo­ni­sing the rules in the rail­way sec­tor and the inclu­si­on of this packa­ge in the agree­ment on land transport.

The issues at stake:

●Revi­si­on of the Rail­ways Act in view of the adop­ti­on of the EU’s 4th rail­way package
Objec­ti­ve: to main­tain inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty with the Euro­pean rail network

●Cen­tral ele­ment: access to the sim­pli­fied appro­val pro­ce­du­re of the Euro­pean Rail­way Agen­cy ERA

●Har­mo­nis­ed gui­de­li­nes for tech­ni­cal inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty and safe­ty standards
What has been done so far
 

Since 16 June 2019, the 4th EU rail­way packa­ge has been in force and the Euro­pean Rail­way Agen­cy (ERA) is now respon­si­ble for issuing uni­form safe­ty cer­ti­fi­ca­tes and appro­vals for rol­ling stock inten­ded for cross-bor­der traffic.

The EU’s 4th rail­way packa­ge con­tains three key elements:

The app­li­ca­ble direc­ti­ves must be sys­te­ma­ti­cal­ly har­mo­nis­ed in all par­ti­ci­pa­ting sta­tes. This is done by means of insti­tu­tio­nal pro­ce­du­res for brin­ging TSIs into force and updating them. Thus, TSIs publis­hed by the Euro­pean Com­mis­si­on are now direct­ly app­li­ca­ble in all Sta­tes; there is no lon­ger any need for natio­nal imple­men­ta­ti­on pro­ces­ses.

The ERA now ensu­res that the com­pe­tent natio­nal super­vi­so­ry aut­ho­ri­ties remo­ve all obso­le­te natio­nal requi­re­ments as soon as possible.

The ERA now coor­di­na­tes the appro­val pro­ce­du­res and has cen­tral­ly avail­ab­le uni­form ope­ra­ting aut­ho­ri­sa­ti­ons valid in all countries.
The ERA has the online vehi­cle appro­val por­tal “One-Stop Shop”. It works clo­se­ly with the natio­nal super­vi­so­ry aut­ho­ri­ties to check the appro­val docu­ments. Today, it is pos­si­ble to apply for a per­mit and sub­mit the cor­re­spon­ding file in the ERA’s “One-Stop Shop”. The ERA exami­nes the app­li­ca­ti­on with the help of the rele­vant natio­nal super­vi­so­ry aut­ho­ri­ties and issu­es an ope­ra­ting licence that is direct­ly valid in all the coun­tries requested.

Switz­er­land has taken over the rele­vant tech­ni­cal pro­vi­si­ons of the three EU rail­way packa­ges in the frame­work of the Land Trans­port Agree­ment (LTA) with the EU. With the tech­ni­cal pil­lar of the 4th rail­way packa­ge, the EU is advan­cing the har­mo­ni­sa­ti­on of direc­ti­ves and pro­ce­du­res. Switz­er­land the­re­fo­re intends to intro­du­ce equi­va­lent regu­la­ti­ons.

The Federal Office of Trans­port (FOT) is the­re­fo­re plan­ning a cor­re­spon­ding revi­si­on of the Rail­ways Act (RTA), which it out­lined in its dis­patch to par­lia­ment on 22 Febru­a­ry 2023. The FOT intends to ensu­re that the rail­way sec­tor has access to sim­pli­fied appro­val pro­ce­du­res and that both inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty and safe­ty stan­dards are gua­ran­te­ed. An amend­ment to the TTA and Switz­er­lan­d’s mem­bers­hip of the Euro­pean Rail­way Agen­cy (ERA) will be necessa­ry at a later date.

The revised LCdF creates equivalent conditions

The tech­ni­cal pil­lar of the EU’s 4th rail­way packa­ge inclu­des the revi­si­on of the inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty (Direc­ti­ve (EU) 2016/797) and rail­way safe­ty (Direc­ti­ve (EU) 2016/798) regu­la­ti­ons, as well as the trans­for­ma­ti­on of the ERA into an EU super­vi­so­ry aut­ho­ri­ty with a one-stop shop for the sim­pli­fied pro­ce­du­re (see blog post “Switz­er­land risks being iso­la­ted in inter­na­tio­nal rail traf­fic”).

The revi­si­on of the Rail­way Act lays the foun­da­ti­ons for the imple­men­ta­ti­on of the tech­ni­cal pil­lar of the 4th rail­way packa­ge. This sti­pu­la­tes that all Swiss rail­way under­ta­kings ope­ra­ting in the inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty mode must be sub­ject to con­di­ti­ons equi­va­lent to those impo­sed on EU Mem­ber Sta­tes. Howe­ver, by revi­sing the CdT, Switz­er­land does not anti­ci­pa­te any com­mit­ments, as the obli­ga­ti­ons must be rati­fied by both par­ties as part of the updating of the TTA.

Adapting the ordinances as well

On the basis of the amend­ments to the CdT, the FOT will then be able to imple­ment the necessa­ry adap­t­ati­ons to the EU direc­ti­ves in the ordi­nan­ces. The FOT has the­re­fo­re alrea­dy pre­pa­red the cor­re­spon­ding draft amend­ments to the ordi­nan­ces and had them che­cked by the Euro­pean Com­mis­si­on – with a posi­ti­ve result. Switz­er­land has thus inde­pendent­ly crea­ted the basis for its legis­la­ti­on to be equi­va­lent to that of the EU.

Positive responses to the consultation

The feed­back on the con­sul­ta­ti­on was all posi­ti­ve, with the excep­ti­on of the SVP and Inclu­si­on Han­di­cap, the umbrel­la asso­cia­ti­on of Swiss disa­bi­li­ty orga­ni­sa­ti­ons, which expres­sed sub­stan­ti­al reser­va­tions. The FOT has incor­po­ra­ted the chan­ges to the text of the law that emer­ged from the con­sul­ta­ti­on into its mes­sa­ge in full.

A comprehensive message that makes sense
With the revi­si­on of the LCdF imple­men­ted auto­no­mous­ly, Switz­er­land has gai­ned pre­cious time. It usual­ly takes several years befo­re a revi­si­on of the law can be put into effect. In this case, the legal frame­work con­di­ti­ons are alrea­dy in place to imple­ment the ATT as soon as poli­ti­cal­ly pos­si­ble in the con­text of the 4th FP (VT). We assu­me that this adap­t­ati­on will take con­si­der­ab­ly less time. The Federal Coun­cil’s mes­sa­ge inclu­des all of our deman­ds, the cen­tral point of which is the pro­mo­ti­on of inter­ope­ra­bi­li­ty in Switzerland.

Processing in Parliament

The Federal Coun­cil’s mes­sa­ge on the pro­po­sed amend­ments to the CdTL has yet to be dealt with by Par­lia­ment and is expec­ted to be on the agen­da of the Coun­cil of Sta­tes in the sum­mer ses­si­on of 2023, as it has alrea­dy been for­war­ded by the CTT‑E on 4 April 2023.

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