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 Contents

01 About This Document 02

02 Current Status and Trend of Railway Wireless Communications 03

2.1 Current Status 04
2.2 Development Trend 05
2.3 Wireless Technology Status 06
2.4 Summary 06

03 Overall Technical Analysis 07

3.1 FRMCS Network Service Analysis 08

3.2 FRMCS Radio Frequency Selection 10
3.3 TDD Analysis 10

04 FRMCS Network Architecture Analysis 12

4.1 Wireless Network Architecture of FRMCS 14

4.2 Wireless Redundancy Networking Solution 14
4.3 Scenario Design for Wireless 15
4.4 Core Network Architecture of FRMCS 16

05 Key Technologies of FRMCS Wireless Network 18

5.1 Improving the FRMCS Wireless Network Coverage by High-Power UEs 19

5.2 Improving FRMCS Wireless Network Quality by Multi-array Smart Antennas 20
5.3 Optimizing Performance for High-Speed Mobility Scenarios 20
5.4 Improving FRMCS Wireless Network Reliability Through the Redundancy Solution 22

06 Conclusion 24

3 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 01
 About This Document

Being widely used for more than 20 years, GSM-R is a successful railway train-to-ground communication
system. However, with the development of railway digital transformation, GSM-R with only 4 MHz
02
bandwidth cannot provide sufficient capacity in railway stations, hubs, and rail merging areas. Due to co-
channel and adjacent-channel interference, GSM-R network planning is becoming more and more difficult.
Current Status and Trend of
In addition, the GSM-R product obsolescence is an inevitable concern for railway infrastructure managers.
In order to further improve transportation efficiency, ensure railway operation safety, and guarantee smooth
Railway Wireless Communications
system evolution, International Union of Railways (UIC) has started researching on the Future Railway
Mobile Communication System (FRMCS) project in 2012.

This white paper discusses key aspects of FRMCS, such as services, frequencies, and the architecture,
and provides relevant suggestions, aiming to function as a technical reference for railway infrastructure
managers in FRMCS construction.

02 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 03
 Current Status and Trend of Railway
Wireless Communications
2.1 Current Status
In 1994, GSM was selected by UIC as the train-to-ground wireless communication system. Originated from European
Integrated Railway Radio Enhanced Network (EIRNEN), GSM-R was standardized and reinforced by ETSI. Its frequency
bands,876-880 MHz (train to ground) and 921-925 MHz (ground to train), was allocated by the European Union (EU).
The EU began to deploy GSM-R networks in 1997 and has deployed more than 100,000 km of GSM-R railway lines.
China has also introduced the GSM-R technology in the early 21th century and has deployed more than 65,000 km
of GSM-R railway lines as well. These reliable, safe, and mature commercial networks have witnessed the success of
GSM-R for 20+ years.
However, as a customized railway GSM system, the GSM-R ecosystem is strongly subject to telecom industry lifecycles.
After 20 years, main-stream mobile operators in the world gradually stopped GSM network construction and started to
refarm GSM networks. It is foreseeable that GSM-R will soon reach the end of life.
In addition, as a narrow-band communications system with 4 MHz bandwidth, GSM-R provides only basic train-
dispatching voice communication and ETCS signal bearers, leaving no capacity for additional services.
Due to such limitations, value-added services over GSM-R, such as railway multimedia dispatching communications,
railway infrastructure smart management, trackside IoT, prediction maintenance and passenger service information
transmission, cannot be deployed flexibly.
Although IP-based GPRS was introduced to Europe and China in 2013 to further expand the data capacity of GSM-R,
there is no successful commercial use of mission critical services over GPRS due to two fundamental reasons. First, the
best-effort data principle of GPRS cannot guarantee the high QoS requirement of the railway industry. Second, the
narrow band itself constrains the usage of GPRS. Therefore, the application scenarios of GPRS are limited to non-safety-
oriented, discontinuous, small-data-packet services. Additionally, GSM-R cannot bear moving blocks that can improve
the railways' overall capacity.
In summary, a broadband wireless communications system is expected to meet the surging requirements of railway
applications.
04 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper
2.2 Development Trend
With the development of railway information technologies, railway operators expect smart, visualized, efficient, safe, and
reliable railways. However, all these features require larger bandwidth and lower latency than those provided by GSM-R.
In 2012, UIC established the FRMCS project team and started the study on the next-generation railway mobile
communications system. Three work groups have been set up for the FRMCS project. The function work group is
responsible for formulating user requirements and functional requirements. The architecture and technology work group
is responsible for formulating system requirements and technical solutions. The frequency work group is in charge of
studying frequency-related topics of the FRMCS.
In 2019, FRMCS has released the User Requirements Specification (URS) v4.0.0. The first complete version of the
Functional Requirement Specification (FRS) and System Requirements Specification (SRS) will be released in the near
future.
As FRMCS uses 3GPP technologies, it is expected that the essential requirements of FRMCS will be incorporated
into 3GPP. In 2016, ETSI and 3GPP started to analyze the gap between railway service requirements and Release 14
specifications. Since 3GPP Release 15, LTE-based mission critical services have been supplemented and improved based
on railway service requirements.
Unlike GSM-R, FRMCS adopts a three-stratum architecture, consisting of the application stratum, service stratum,
and transport stratum. Each stratum is decoupled from others. This new architecture facilitates expansion of railway
applications (such as management visualization, prediction maintenance, intrusion alarm, precise positioning, digital
map, and disaster alarm). In addition, this decoupled architecture allows railway operators to choose 4G, 5G or other
RATs for the transport stratum based on their service requirements and business/ecosystem maturity.
As the members of UIC, EU railway organizations own huge interconnected railway networks and they have conducted
a lot of researches on the frequency bands that may be used by FRMCS.
According to the resolution released by the Radio Spectrum Committee (RSC) under the European Commission, FRMCS
bandwidth would expand from 2 x 4 MHz to 2 x 5.6 MHz (874.4–880 MHz/919.4–925 MHz). In addition, a 10 MHz
frequency band (1900–1910 MHz) is used as a supplement to the 900 MHz frequency band.
Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 05
 • By 1 January 2022, Member States shall designate and make available on a non-exclusive basis the paired frequency
bands 874,4-880,0 MHz and 919,4-925,0 MHz for Railway Mobile Radio

• At the latest by 1 January 2025, based on national demand, EU Member States shall designate and make available
on a non-exclusive basis the unpaired frequency band 1 900-1 910 MHz for Railway Mobile Radio

(COMMISSION IMPLEMENTING DECISION (EU) 2021/1730 of 28 September 2021)

03
Based on the market demand, band availability, and the development of FRMCS standards, major railway operators in
Europe will pilot FRMCS in 2023–2025 and start FRMCS deployment in 2025.

2.3 Wireless Technology Status

The wireless communication technology has developed rapidly in the last decades. LTE, as a mainstream technology,
Overall Technical Analysis
has been commercialized by telecom operators around the world and achieved great success. According to the GSMA
report, in Asia, CIS and Latin America, the percentage of LTE network connections has reached 58% in 2021 and will
reach about 68% by 2025, and the percentage for Sub-Saharan Africa will be double by 2025.

As a mature technology, LTE has been proposed to be the carrier of railway industry in some regions (including Korea
Train Express, heavy-haul railways in China, urban rail transit in China, and urban rail transit in France), laying a solid
foundation for ecosystem construction. Considering the migration from 4G to 5G, some 4G products have been
designed to be evolvable to 5G. This will benefit railway construction.

5G, as the evolution technology of 4G, is also becoming commercially available. Some frequency bands such as C-band
and mmWave band were introduced to 5G. This will greatly expand the available frequencies. In the future, it will also
provide E2E train-to-ground railway mobile communication capabilities for FRMCS networks.

2.4 Summary

In general, GSM-R based on 2G network cannot catch up the development of railway industry. The long-term evolution
FRMCS with broad bandwidth and new decoupling architecture based on LTE or more advanced technologies would be
accepted by more and more railway operators.

06 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 07
 Overall Technical Analysis

Railway services are classified into eight types based on service priorities, reliability requirements, and bandwidth
3.1 FRMCS Network Service Analysis
requirements.

The FRMCS aims at building a digital, intelligent, and efficient railway communication network. In addition to ETCS train Service Flow Service
No. Service Type Priority Bandwidth (Per User)
control and voice-based dispatching based on the traditional GSM-R network, it also requires the following innovative Direction Continuity
applications: Train-to-ground 32 kbit/s, symmetric in the
1 Railway emergency call 0 Continuity
Ground-to-ground uplink and downlink
1. Automatic Train Operation (ATO) Train dispatch and Train-to-ground
32 kbit/s, symmetric in the
The ATO system is mainly used to implement ground-to-train control. Specifically, the ATO system sends signals from 2 emergency voice 1 Train-to-train Continuity
uplink and downlink
the ground to control train, such as running and braking, opening or closing train doors. As a result, the train runs communications Ground-to-ground

safely and smoothly under the best working conditions. Train control and running Train-to-ground
3 1 Continuity 150 kbit/s
safety data services Ground-to-ground
The ATO information is transmitted by the way of point-to-point data transmission. In ATO train control sections, on- Train-to-ground
Non-running dispatch and 32 kbit/s, symmetric in the
board devices send information such as the train status, running speed, train control policy, and accurate intra-station 4 2 Ground-to-ground Continuity
O&M voice uplink and downlink
stopping to ground devices. Ground devices send information such as the operation plan and line data to on-board Inside the train
devices. For ATO information transmission, the train-to-ground communication bandwidth (UL and DL) should be at Running safety video and Train-to-ground
5 2 Continuity 1024 kbit/s in the uplink
least 40 kbit/s, the E2E transmission delay should be less than 150 ms, and the packet loss rate should be less than emergency video Ground-to-ground
or equal to 0.1%.
Video-based dispatch and Train-to-ground 1024 kbit/s, symmetric in the
6 2/3 Continuity
operation communications Ground-to-ground uplink and downlink
2. Video services
Train-to-ground Resumable
Video services play an important role for digital railways. The functions, such as transverse intrusion alarm, trackside 7 O&M detection data 4 512 kbit/s in the uplink
Ground-to-ground transmission
disaster alarm, maintenance assistant, and driver behave assessment, greatly improve the efficiency of railway
Remote O&M data
operation and decrease the loss of incident or disaster. Train-to-ground Resumable
8 update on train and O&M 4 1024 kbit/s in the downlink
Ground-to-ground transmission
operation guide
Video services include:
a) Point-to-point video service;
b) Point-to-multipoint video service; As shown in the table above, the services with higher priorities include emergency call services, train dispatch and
c) Area- or user-based video group call services. emergency voice communications and train control and dispatch services. In any case, these services should be
guaranteed for safety operation of trains.
Generally, the uplink rate of a single video is higher than 1024 kbit/s, which indicates a larger capacity requirement
of wireless networks. However, not all video services belong to train safety services. Video services can be carried over The table below shows the estimated bandwidth requirements (in Mbit/s) for large and normal-sized railway stations
Wi-Fi or public networks, especially in railway stations and depots. and track side based on the bandwidth analysis above.

08 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 09
 Normal-sized Railway
Large Railway Station Track Side • Asymmetric uplink and downlink services are supported, meeting railway service requirements.
Service Type Station
TDD is a high spectral efficiency technology, which allows allocating resources flexibly when the uplink and downlink
UL DL UL DL UL DL
carry unbalanced traffic. This advantage is suitable for most services running on the FRMCS network and requiring
Running application and O&M 13.77 14.34 5.92 6.09 4.40 4.45
more uplink resource to transmit data, such as remote train management, wireless management of railway
Running application 7.36 7.93 4.26 4.43 3.52 3.58
infrastructure, railway multimedia dispatch and command communications, and railway IoT.

3.2 FRMCS Radio Frequency Selection
The radio frequency is the prerequisite of the railway mobile communications. It involves the ecosystem, cost and the
performance of the network. The following describes the available frequencies of the FRMCS.
As mentioned above, the Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2021/1730 released on September 28, 2021 specifies
that FDD 874.4–880.0 MHz (for uplink transmission from the UE to the base station), FDD 919.4–925.0 MHz (for
downlink transmission from the base station to the UE) and TDD 1900–1910 MHz be used as radio frequencies of
the FRMCS in Europe. FDD 2x5.6 MHz is a traditional railway radio frequency, but it is not included in 3GPP. Therefore,
currently it is difficult to find products based on this frequency unless more R&D is invested to develop products
dedicated for the railway.
In contrast, TDD 1900–1910 MHz belongs to B39/N39 (1880–1920 MHz), and it is included in 3GPP. Most mainstream
commercial products, such as base stations and handsets, support LTE B39. Some industry handsets support this band
as well, which means that the E2E-based LTE is more realistic and mature. Currently, 5G is not the priority of the
ecosystem because the 5G target is to expand the available frequency of C-band and mmWave. The ecosystem would
be a problem if it is used for railway communications directly.
• Paired frequencies are not required, lowering the frequency acquisition difficulty.
For the FRMCS, Sub 2 GHz is used to achieve large-scale coverage and reduce inter-cell handovers and Doppler
shift. These frequency bands are named golden bands, and have been allocated to telecom operators. FDD uses
paired frequencies, further increasing the difficulty to acquire frequencies. The TDD mode which can used asymmetric
scattered frequency has been gradually accepted by industry operator.
• There is reciprocity between uplink and downlink channels.
Channel estimation is important for the wireless system. The result of channel estimation reflects the air interface
status, such as propagation, frequency shift, and interference. As the same frequency is shared for the TDD network,
base stations can predict the downlink channel model based on the uplink channel information reported by UEs. This
mechanism facilitates the application of intelligent multi-antenna technologies and helps achieve accurate Doppler
frequency shift compensation.
Currently, TDD networks have been maturely and widely used around the world. Parts of networks have been
deployed along railways by operators for customer connection, and the performance of TDD technologies in high-
speed mobility scenarios has been fully verified.
Therefore, considering technical features and industry development, TDD 1900 MHz can be preferentially used for
the FRMCS network.
After the GSM-R network reaches the end of service (EOS), the symmetric 874.4–880.0 MHz (uplink)/919.4–925.0
MHz (downlink) can be used for the FRMCS FDD network which serves as a supplement to the existing TDD
network.

All in all, LTE TDD 1900 MHz is the preferred frequency for the FRMCS currently.

3.3 TDD Analysis

TDD is a high spectral efficiency technology, and TDD 1900–1910 MHz is therefore introduced to the FRMCS. For FDD,
paired frequencies are used for the uplink and downlink transmission. For TDD, the same frequency is shared by the
uplink and downlink at different time and users can flexibly adjust the uplink and downlink resource assignment based
on service requirements. Compared with FDD, TDD has the following advantages:

10 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 11
 FRMCS Network Architecture Analysis

04 With the development of wireless communications technologies and virtualization technologies, the networking
architectures in the 4G and 5G eras have changed greatly compared with those in the 2G and 3G eras. Since 4G,
the base station controller in 2G/3G has been removed. The network construction is further simplified, and the E2E

FRMCS Network Architecture transmission delay of the network is shortened. Unlike GSM-R networks that use TDM transmission, LTE and beyond
networks support E2E IP transmission. This makes it possible to decouple services from networks. From the perspective

Analysis
of the overall architecture, an FRMCS network consists of five parts: core network, radio access network, user device,
operating system, and railway MCX system. The following figure shows the overall network architecture.

Railway MCX Server

FRMCS OSS FRMCS Core Network

IP Transmission
Network

FRMCS Base Station

Cab Radio Handheld UE

The following describes the architecture and networking analysis of the core network and radio access network, which
are key for the FRMCS.

12 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 13

4.1 Wireless Network Architecture of FRMCS
Since the 3G era, to reduce the construction cost and simplify the operation, the distributed base station (BBU+RRU)
architecture is introduced to replace the traditional macro base station. The RRU is deployed apart from the BBU.
This architecture is followed by LTE and 5G eras. Therefore, macro base stations in GSM-R will not exist in the FRMCS
wireless network. Instead, the distributed base station architecture will be used. BBUs are deployed in equipment rooms
along railways. RRUs can be flexibly deployed together with the BBU or deployed remotely.
4.2 Wireless Redundancy Networking Solution
High reliability is the essential requirement for ETCS transport network. A single point of failure should avoid affecting
the system services. Based on the experience of GSM-R, the redundancy mechanism was introduced in the FRMCS
network design.
In general, there are two redundancy modes for base stations: co-site dual network and interleaving dual network.
In the co-site dual network coverage mode, two independent base stations are deployed at the same site and are
connected to different core networks to form a two-layer network. Antennas can be shared or used separately. The
coverage areas of the two layers of networks basically overlap. The coverage mode of each layer of network is similar to
that of a single network.
In the interleaving dual network coverage mode, the field strengths for two neighboring base stations overlap deeply.
Both the odd- and even-numbered base stations can independently provide full coverage, and ensure overlapping
coverage areas for handovers. The odd- and even-numbered base stations are connected to different core networks,
forming a two-layer network.
Odd-numbered site Odd-numbered site Odd-numbered site Odd-numbered site
Even-numbered site Even-numbered site Even-numbered site
14 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper
The performance of the two networking modes is similar. The co-site networking mode features low investment and
simple engineering and O&M. The interleaving networking mode features good disaster recovery but high investment.
The networking modes can be selected according to the actual situation in engineering.
According to the requirements of redundancy network, the 10 MHz frequency band of 1900–1910 MHz can be split into
two 5 MHz frequency bands.
Channel No. Operating Frequency Band (MHz) Channel Center Frequency (MHz)
F1 1900 ～ 1905 1902.5
F2 1905 ～ 1910 1907.5
4.3 Scenario Design for Wireless
The railway infrastructure mainly includes railway depots/stations, rail crossing and merging sections, and tunnels. Each
scenario should be delicately designed based on the coverage and capacity requirements.
• Main line: Compared with railway depots/stations, and rail crossing and merging sections, main lines have lower
requirements on the wireless network capacity. Therefore, base stations with BBUs, RRUs, and passive antennas
can be used.
• Railway depot/station: According to the FRMCS use cases issued by UIC, there are many types of communications
at a railway depot/station, such as voice, data and video communications between train dispatch group members
and between goods inspection personnel, train inspection personnel, train on-duty personnel, and ground
operators or mission critical scenarios. The FRMCS system with a bandwidth of 10 MHz cannot offer enough
capacity for all application services. Therefore, the FRMCS network at railway depots/stations should preferentially
guarantee critical services. Other applications can be carried on the public network or Wi-Fi.
• Rail crossing and merging sections: For rail crossing sections, multiple lines can share one base station. The base
station is installed near the crossing point. Multiple antennas are used for the shared base station to meet the
coverage requirements of different lines. The multi-site cell technology is used to logically combine RRUs at
different physical sites into one cell and to reduce the number of handovers and reselections, thereby improving
network performance. For the rail merging section, a proper wireless coverage solution needs to be adopted
based on the distance between two rails. To avoid interference between lines, narrow-beam antennas can be
used to concentrate energy on each line.
• Tunnel: FRMCS can also be used in weak coverage sections such as tunnels. The RRU+leaky cable coverage
solution is used in tunnels. In this solution, a wideband leaky cable can be used for both FRMCS and public
networks, reducing facility layout and maintenance workload in tunnels.
Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 15
 • Railway MCX Server
4.4 Core Network Architecture of FRMCS
The MCX server, as the key component, was introduced in railway for the first time.

The FRMCS core network provides management and control functions for users, services, resources, and safety. It plays
It includes the SIP Core, interface gateway, and mission critical applications.
an important role in the FRMCS system. It is responsible for the access of the radio access network and user device,
and interconnection with service and application layers. Based on 3GPP specifications, public network technologies, and
The SIP Core provides functions such as registration, service selection, and routing on the signaling control plane.
railway application experience, the FRMCS core network is added with railway-specific functional NEs to form a system
architecture consisting of the FRMCS core network, railway MCX server, and application platform.
The interface gateway supports functions such as interconnection with the existing railway communications system.

The mission critical service application consists of the railway broadband trunking voice communications
GSM-R (MCPTT), railway broadband trunking video communications (MCVideo), and railway broadband trunking data
communications (MCData) to implement call control for voice, video, and data trunking communications services,
Interoperability Railway MCX Server
Fixed Line respectively.

PSTN FRMCS Core Network

IP Transmission

FRMCS Base Station

• FRMCS Core Network

According to the strategy of FRMCS, the standard complies with 3GPP, which means that the FRMCS core network
would be a typical 3GPP-compliant core network. It has essential core network functions such as network access
control, registration and connection management, access and mobility management, registration area management,
and policy control, and carries basic data transmission services. The FRMCS core network adopts a cloud-based
architecture and uses the universal servers enhanced by the SDN/NFV technology.

With the maturity of virtualization technologies, FRMCS core network supports dedicated data centers and
cloudbased systems.

The disaster recovery must be considered during the design. Especially, the load sharing architecture of two
redundancy core networks should be introduced as a cost-efficient and reliable solution to avoid single point of
failure.

16 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 17
 Key Technologies of FRMCS Wireless
Network

05 It is a common sense that 1900 MHz provides a poorer coverage than 900 MHz. To reduce the investment of railway
operators, it is worth finding new technology to improve the 1900 MHz coverage.

Key Technologies of FRMCS

Wireless Network 5.1 Improving the FRMCS Wireless Network Coverage by High-Power UEs

Compared with the traditional GSM-R, FRMCS UEs have limited uplink radio power. As shown in the following table, the
radio power of LTE and 5G UEs cannot exceed 23 dBm according to 3GPP specifications. LTE and 5G UEs for industries
strictly comply with this limitation at present.

Table 6.2.2.1: UE Power Class

EUTRA band Class 1 (dBm) Tolerance (dB) Class 2 (dBm) Tolerance (dB) Class 3 (dBm) Tolerance (dB) Class 4 (dBm) Tolerance (dB)
1 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
4 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
5 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
6 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
9 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
10 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
11 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
13 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
14 31 +2/-3 - - 23 +2/-2 - -

17 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
19 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
20 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
21 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
22 - - - - 23 +2/-3.5 - -
24 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
27 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
28 - - - - 23 +2/-2.5 - -
30 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
31 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
…
33 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
34 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
35 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
36 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
37 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
38 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
39 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
40 - - - - 23 +2/-2 - -
42 - - - - 23 +2/-3 - -
43 - - - - 23 +2/-3 - -
44 - - - - 23 +2/-3 - -
NOTE 1 Void
NOTE 2 For the UE which supports both Band 11 and Band 21 operating frequencies, the tolerance is FFS.

18 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 19
 However, the radio power of GSM-R UEs could reach 33 dBm (handheld UEs) and 39 dBm (vehicle-mounted UEs).
Under the same conditions, the coverage capability of the FRMCS 1900 MHz with 23 dBm UEs is only one third of that
of the GSM-R 900 MHz with 33 dBm handheld UEs.
Therefore, increasing the radio power of LTE and 5G UEs is the key to improve the FRMCS coverage capability. According
to simulation based on the Okumura-Hata model, if the uplink radio power of an FRMCS UE can reach 33 dBm, the
coverage capability of the FRMCS can reach 60% of that of the GSM-R network. This greatly reduces the investment on
FRMCS sites.
• Frequent handovers: When a train moves at a high speed, the onboard device would experience frequent handovers.
As a result, its throughput may decrease or service interruption may occur.
To solve the Doppler shift problem, the base station estimates the frequency offset of the onboard device based on the
pilot signals of the uplink channel and continuously corrects the UE's frequency. This technology improves the uplink cell
throughput, ensuring the throughput and access capability of railway mobile devices in high-speed scenarios. According
to the statistical experience, this feature can effectively ensure the wireless signal quality when the moving speed is
higher than 200 km.

5.2 Improving FRMCS Wireless Network Quality by Multi-array Smart Antennas

f f
As wireless communications technologies develop, the multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technology has been
widely used by LTE and 5G networks. Signals are transmitted and received through multiple antennas simultaneously
θ θ
to improve communications quality. It can multiply the system channel capacity without increasing spectrum resources
d
and antenna transmit power. According to the statistical results of operator networks, for example, compared with 4T4R,
coverage and capacity of 8T8R are significantly improved.
f+fd f-fd

3~5dB@ Since the LTE era, the distributed base station architecture has been widely used, and the multi-RRU cell technology
TDD 4T4R coverage based on the distributed base station architecture is mature and successful. With remote RRU deployment, multiple
RRUs that connect to one BBU and logically belong to one cell can be placed at several sites. The train passing the block
covered by these sites would not experience handovers. This improves the performance of the network.

TDD 8T8R
Capacity: +10%~15%
No handover
TRP: transmission reception point

So 8T8R MIMO should be considered as an important feature to improve wireless network capability. TRP1 TRP2 TRP3 TRP4 TRP5 TRP6

Logical Cell

5.3 Optimizing Performance for High-Speed Mobility Scenarios

With features such as uplink frequency correction and multi-RRU cell, the FRMCS network based on the TDD frequency
band can meet the requirements on wireless signal coverage quality in high-speed scenarios, ensuring stable and
FRMCS networks face the following challenges in high-speed mobility scenarios:
reliable transmission of train control and dispatch services.

• Doppler shift: In high-speed mobility scenarios, the receive frequency of onboard device changes due to the Doppler
affect. This would bring challenges to the demodulation algorithm.

20 Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper Future Railway Mobile Communication System White Paper 21
 MCX Server MCX Server
5.4 Improving FRMCS Wireless Network Reliability Through the
Redundancy Solution

In railway wireless network construction, the major concern is the reliability of the entire network. A single point failure
1+1 redundancy
should not affect critical services. Networking redundancy, device redundancy, and board redundancy can be used to
guarantee system reliability.

• Dual network coverage: Two networks are deployed at the same site to provide redundant wireless coverage in the
same area. In normal cases, the two networks work at the same time. The preferential network for access would be
configured. When the working network is faulty, the UE can quickly switch to the standby network. The switchover
time can be controlled within 10 seconds to ensure that critical services are not affected.

• RRU ring network: Using the distributed base station architecture, one BBU is connected to multiple RRUs at different
physical sites. Multiple RRUs can be connected in ring topology. When the optical fiber between the BBU and one • Board redundancy backup: In addition to networking- and device-level redundancy solutions, the power module,
RRU is faulty, the fast switchover in the ring can be performed to ensure the normal operation of the base station. the main control board of the base station and FRMCS core network should also have redundancy backup
capabilities. When the active board is faulty, the system can automatically switch to the standby board without
manual intervention. In addition, the FRMCS network devices must support online capacity expansion so that the
network reliability is not affected when services are added or expanded.
RRU RRU RRU

BBU

• Remote device disaster recovery: If the FRMCS core network is faulty, the FRMCS system will be greatly affected. So
the remote disaster recovery solution, the load-sharing redundancy, should be used to improve the reliability of the
core network.

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 Conclusion

06 The development of FRMCS wireless networks depends on various factors, such as standards, industry maturity, and
technology capability. As the important infrastructure of railway informatization, modernization and intelligentization,

Conclusion the development of the FRMCS network requires the joint promotion of industry organizations, standard associations,
device vendors, and railway proprietors. Currently, 3GPP wireless broadband technologies are mature. Based on the
mature ecosystem and industry technologies compliant with 3GPP, the FRMCS solution has become an inevitable trend
for the railway industry.

Now the FRMCS frequencies have been allocated and the demand for railway digital transformation is strong. Huawei
do believe that the FRMCS era is coming and it will be the next successful train-to-ground wireless communication
solution worldwide if all the players in the ecosystem cooperate now.

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