Implementation of River Information Services in Europe

NEED AND ADDED VALUE FOR THE DANUBE REGION STRATEGY: IRIS Europe 3 – as international multi-beneficiary project – contributed significantly to fulfilling the objectives as laid down in Priority Area 1a of the EU Strategy for the Danube Region – to improve mobility and multimodality on inland waterways. All Danube countries were involved either as fully financed or as cooperation partners within IRIS Europe 3. The beneficiaries of IRIS Europe 3 were the European Union Member States, represented by their Ministries of Transport. OBJECTIVE(S) OF THE PROJECT: IRIS Europe 3 ensured the continuation of RIS implementation in Europe and provided the necessary cooperative implementation framework for setting up pilot implementations for Quality of Information Services for RIS, nationally and internationally. Quality aspects for international RIS data exchange on technical, legal and organisational level were implemented, so that enhanced pilot implementations of new RIS services based on existing and new RIS key technologies could be implemented. New and enhanced interfaces to European Services were pilot implemented and validated, and continuous contributions to the maintenance and amendment of Standards and technical specifications were provided. CONDUCTED PROJECT ACTIVITIES: - Alignment of RIS Service Qualities, especially in the Danube region. Main objective was to improve the interoperability between the national RIS implementations and to elaborate, agree and establish a RIS service catalogue. Service based architectures for RIS were elaborated, where the multitude of basic data / reference data for the provision and seamless operation of RIS were analysed and inventoried. Through these measures it was possible to achieve a higher consistency and coherency of data, and changes (e.g. in the RIS related Standards) can be easier implemented on national level. - Further enhancement of the international exchange of RIS data, on legal, organisational and technical level. Main objective was that IRIS Europe 3 becomes an enabler for the pilot operation of the international RIS data exchange, as it was established within IRIS Europe II. There were several unsolved challenges that required special attention within IRIS Europe 3. This specifically refers to the Service Agreements for the international RIS data exchange in Europe that required a European platform for further discussion and eventual conclusion of such Service Agreements, including a further support from the IRIS Europe 3 Members States towards a supplementation of the EU RIS Directive 2005/44/EC with provisions for the international data exchange. This also applies to the data exchange with the European Services as established by PLATINA. IRIS Europe 3 facilitated the interoperability and compatibility of the required national interconnections to the European Services, and established new interconnections. - Implementation of pilot installations of new and innovative services and applications, for example the Inland Navigation Receiver (INAV Receiver) as follow-up activity of the Low Cost Heading Device. Furthermore, feasibility studies and pilot implementations of assistance systems for fuel saving (Low Cost Fuel Saving Device), mobile RIS applications and enhanced reference stations for the improvement of positioning information (Virtual Reference Station) as basis for new navigational support services were conducted. - Enhancement of the interfaces for logistics and governmental stakeholders. This included further developments of RIS for logistics, as initially investigated by the FP7 Research and Development project RISING. Value added services based on RIS were analysed and brought towards pilot implementation / operation. New governmental user groups were integrated into RIS, providing for example supporting services for waste management in inland navigation, or for improving and streamlining the calamity and incident management process with the support of RIS. - Improvement of Fairway Information Services through pilot implementation of bathymetric Inland Electronic Navigations Charts (IENC) and the integration of low water section information. Also the international exchange of IENCs was facilitated by means of pilot implementations and the facilitation of the standardisation process of such IENC data exchange. For RIS network data (e.g. data contained in the RIS Index) an alignment with the INSPIRE Directive was sought, and pilot implementations of enhanced reference data management were performed. - Support the transition from pilot operation into regular RIS operation. Main objective was to establish a cooperation in which RIS providers can exchange experiences and best practice in terms of RIS provision and operation. This shall enable an alignment of the operational RIS parameters and shall help the RIS providers to perform their daily tasks more efficiently. The elaboration of a RIS Service Catalogue and a sustainable RIS operation concept formed the focal points of this activity. - Establish and provide a cooperation forum for RIS authorities, RIS providers, fairway and traffic authorities, waterway management organisations, logistics stakeholders, representatives from the RIS industry (RIS Stakeholder Forum), in close cooperation with the RIS Expert Groups and the supporting structures established by PLATINA. TRANSBOUNDARY IMPACT: Directly involved countries (beneficiaries): Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Czech Republic, Poland. Countries involved though cooperation agreements (cooperation partners): Germany, Croatia, Serbia, Ukraine, France, The Netherlands, Belgium. PROJECT BENEFICIARIES / TARGET GROUPS: Direct beneficiaries are the Fairway, Traffic and RIS Authorities and the related RIS Providers of the participating countries. Indirect beneficiaries of the further enhancement of River Information Services within IRIS Europe 3 are the commercial users of the waterway, as they receive value-added services, increased interoperability and quality of River Information Services especially along the Danube corridor.