Outcomes, Insights and Best Practices from IIC Testbeds: LTE for Metro Testbed
dedicated test time. To account for the day-
to-day operations of the metro company,
tests were performed very early in the
morning.
needs.
Currently, no technical standards based on
LTE for the urban rail industry have been
released by international standards
organizations. The testbed team hopes that
the IIC LTE for Metro Testbed will introduce
the benefits achieved by the application of
LTE technology in urban rail wireless
communication
for
rail
operators
worldwide. Before LTE for metro, metro
operators commonly used Wi-Fi as the major
ground-to-train communication standards
and technology. LTE for metro intends to
enable operators to evolve Wi-Fi network
standards to the next generation on an
international scale.
IIC I NTERACTIONS
The principles found in the IIC’s Industrial
Internet Reference Architecture (IIRA) and
Industrial Internet Security Framework (IISF)
play a significant role in the testbed. There
are aspects of the testbed design which may
have been missing a vital function or service
to fulfill the sought-after solution. The IIC’s
frameworks help to fill gaps in information
or knowledge, providing guidance in
identifying the problem.
Phase one of the testbed will contribute to
the IIC’s work around networks and
connectivity, especially how to use
connectivity and networking in mission
critical environments. The testbed’s second
and later phases will demonstrate the
implementation of cloud platforms and
industrial AI applications that can be used in
the metro rail industry.
T ESTBED R ESULTS
The LTE for Metro Testbed lab test and
corresponding technical and experience
reports have been completed, and the field
test will be completed in the next several
months. The testbed has successfully
verified that urban rail operators can use LTE
wireless communication technology to carry
multiple services rather than having to use
different
communication
network
technologies to separately address critical
and non-critical services. One network is
capable of carrying all critical and non-
critical services.
S TANDARDS
The LTE for Metro Testbed incorporates the
B-Trunking standards of the International
Telecommunication Union (ITU), as well as
the Urban Rail Train-Ground Integrated
Communication System specifications of the
China Association of Metros (CAMET).
CAMET has more than 500 members
including
more
than
50
metro
owners/operators, so it will be vital to
promote the adoption of LTE-for-metro-
related technical specifications to a wider
industry community based on real industrial
From the business perspective, the LTE
network technology greatly simplifies the
architecture of urban rail wireless networks,
helping end users reduce network
maintenance costs and improve operational
efficiency and reliability. The testbed team
has found that with the high-speed mobile
handover algorithm, a PIS system is able to
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March 2020