Telecom equipment vendor Alcatel-Lucent on Tuesday said the urban transport operator STIB will deploy broadband network to ensure communication and safety for its driverless metro rail network in Brussels.
Belgium’s urban public transport operator will benefit from the driverless metro system that will increase train frequency from 24 trains an hour to 40 to cope with the rapid expansion of passenger traffic in the Belgian capital.
Alcatel-Lucent, which is in the process of executing a shift plan strategy, will deploy a WDM (Wavelength Division Multiplexing) network based on the Alcatel-Lucent 1830 Photonic Service Switch (PSS).
As per the broadband network deal, the WDM network will interconnect 70 metro stations, supporting video surveillance and transport of the railway signalling system traffic. Shifting to a fully automated network requires special safety measures, such as a new signaling system, automatically controlled platform gates and more than 10,000 interconnected video-protection cameras.
With over 140 nodes, this is the largest number of Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexer (ROADM) nodes deployed by a metro rail network in any city in the world, said Alcatel-Lucent in a statement.
The fibernet can sustain multiple fiber cuts using failover mechanisms that restore communication links within 50 milliseconds.
Association with Alcatel-Lucent for the broadband network is important as STIB is expected to handle 415 million passengers annually by 2017, a 20 percent increase from the 348.8 million journeys in 2012.
As per the WDM contract, Alcatel-Lucent provides a turnkey solution including the 1830 Photonic Service Switch; the 5620 Service Aware Manager for integrated network and services management; a 5-year maintenance contract; services such as network design, network delivery, network deployment, integration, field maintenance, remote assistance 24/7 helpdesk and 24/7 network monitoring.
Karel Van Oostveldt, senior manager Telecommunications of STIB, said that Alcatel-Lucent will bring foundation for our passengers and mission critical services as well as all innovations which will increase the attractiveness of our public transport offering.