The IRPUD rail network is stored in three ASCII files:

The following table shows the contents of the file RAILLINK.DAT:

Bytes	Length	Type	Contents
1-10	10	Integer	Link-ID (see note)
11-20	10	Real	Node-ID, From-node (see note)
21-30	10	Real	Node-ID, To-node (see note)
31-34	4	Character	ISO country code   XX = Border link (see note)   YY = Rail ferry link (see note)
35-44	10	Integer	Length of link(m)
45-48	4	Integer	Link type   0 = Access link to/from centroid   1 = Rail   2 = Rail ferry   3 = Border link (see note)
49-52	4	Integer	Link category   0 = Access link   1 = Main line, double track, electrified   2 = Main line, double track   3 = Main line, single track, electrified   4 = Main line, single track   5 = Secondary line, double track, electrified   6 = Secondary line, double track   7 = Secondary line, single track, electrified   8 = Secondary line, double track   9 = Narrow gauge line   10 = Rail ferry   11 = Passenger ferry   15 = Planned link (not existing in 2001)
53-56	4	Integer	Use of link   0 = Access link   1 = Passengers only   2 = Freight only   3 = Passengers and freight
57-60	4	Integer	TEN/TINA category (see note)   0 = No TEN/TINA link   1 = High speed line   2 = High speed line, planned   3 = Upgraded high speed line   4 = Planned upgraded high speed line   5 = Conventional line
61-64	4	Integer	TEN/TINA  alignment (see note)   0 = No TEN/TINA link   1 = TEN link with precise alignment   2 = TEN/TINA link with unknown precisealignment
65-68	4	Integer	TEN priority project number (see note)   0 = No TEN specific priority project   1 = High speed train/ combined transport         Nürnberg-Berlin, Verona-Munich, Milano-Naples   2 = High speed rail Paris-Cologne-         Amsterdam-London   3 = High speed rail south: Madrid-Barcelona-         Montpellier/Madrid-Dax   4 = High speed rail Paris-Karlsruhe/          Luxembourg/Saarbruecken   5 = Betuwe Line Rotterdam-Rhine/Ruhr   6 = High speed rail Lyon-Venice-Trieste   8 = Multimodal link: Portugal-Spain-Central Europe   9 = Rail Cork-Dublin-Belfast-Larne-Stranraer   11 = Oeresund rail/road link   12 = Nordic Triangle   14 = West coast main line (United Kingdom)  16 = High capacity rail line across the Pyrenees  17 = High speed train / combined transport            east - west  19 = High speed rail interoperability on the            Iberain peninsula   20 = Fixed link Fehmarn Belt
69-72	4	Integer	Rail category (see note)   0 = No link of strategic netwotk   1 = TEN rail link   2 = TINA rail link, backbone   3 = TINA rail link, additional   4 = Helsinki corridor   5 = Additional link of strategic network
73-74	2	Integer	Strategie network   0 = No link of strategic network   1 = Strategic network

Notes:

Country indicates the ISO-Code of the country in which the link is located.
Border links are zero-length pseudo links between two border nodes with identical coordinates each belonging to one country (see RAILNODE). Border links serve to assign border-related impedances (e.g. waiting time) to border crossings. Because they cannot be assigned to any country, border links have the country code 'XX'. Similarly, rail and passenger ferry links have the country code 'YY'.

Access links are functional pseudo links used for transport modelling to connect centroids to the network. Centroids represent the centres of transport modelling zones and are used their as origins and destinations. Each centroid is connected to the real-word network via one or several access links. If transport models are not to be applied, the access links (and so the centroid nodes) can be dropped from the network without harming the overall network as such.

The link-ID is a unique identifier identifying a link. It serves to relate the coordinate information contained in file RAILARC.DAT to the links in file RAILLINK.DAT. This makes it possible to have more than one link between a pair of nodes. Unlike node-IDs, which are permanently assigned to nodes, link-IDs change from one update of the network database to the next.

Link type, link category and the up of the link give general information on links. Border links have the same link type, link category and use of link as the neighbouring links.

TEN category, TEN alignment, rail category and TEN priority indicate the inclusion of the specified link in the TEN and TINA programmes according to European Commission (1996) and TINA Secretariat (1999). Information on those links which are included in the "Trans European Transport Network Outline Plan, Section Rail" are taken from the "Joint Decision of the European Parliament and of the Council" published in the Official Journal of the European Communities (L228, 9 September 1996). Information on those links which are included in the TINA networks are taken from "TINA Transport Infrastructure needs Assessment. Identification of the Network Components for a future trans-European Transport Network in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia" (TINA Secretariat 1999) as agreed in the European Union and the candidate countries. The TEN priority project number represents the "specific" projects adopted in 1996 (so called "Essen list") and potential "specific" projects as defined by the European Parlament and the council in 2001.

Strategic network indicates whether the link is part of the strategic rail network. The strategic rail network is a subset of the total network used in the DGVII projects STREAMS , SASI and STEMM. The strategic rail network contains the trans-European rail links specified in Decision 1692/96/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council for the EU member states, the TINA networks as agreed between the European Union ant tde candidate countries, the 'Helsinki' corridors towards eastern Europe as well as selected additional links in eastern Europe and further links to guarantee connectivity of regions and centroids.

The following table shows the contents of the file RAILNODE.DAT:

Bytes	Length	Type	Contents
1-10	10	Real	Node-ID xxx.yyyy   xxx = Region-ID (see note)   yyyy = Node number   0000 = Centroid   0001 ... Node number in region
11-20	10	Integer	X coordinate (m)
21-30	10	Integer	Y coordinate (m)
31-34	4	Character	ISO country code (see note)
35-38	4	Character	Region code (see note)
39-42	3	Integer	Node type   0 = Centroid   1 = Border node (see note)   2 = Rail node   3 = Rail ferry seaport   4 = Rail bifurcation/intersection

Notes:

The node-ID is a unique number for each node in the network. The first three digits indicate the number of the region in which the node is located. The region code is a four-character acronym of the name of the region. The ISO country code indicates the country in which the node is located.

The regions are regions of the system of regions defined for the STREAMS and SASI projects. They correspond largely to NUTS-2 regions defined by Eurostat plus equivalent extensions outside the European Union. A more detailed description of the system of regions is available.

The main city (not necessarily the greatest city) of each region is the centroid of the region. For each region the nodes are counted from 0000, with 0000 indicating the centroid.

Border nodes are nodes at national borders. At each border crossing there are two border nodes with identical coordinates each belonging to one country. The two nodes are connected by a zero-length border link (see RAILLINK.DAT).

The following tables give information on the file RAILARC.DAT. This file gives information on the alignment of the road links between nodes by the coordinates of its vertices. This information is used for mapping. For each link, the file contains a block of records. Each block of records consists of a header record and one record for each vertex of the link. The number of records used for each link depends on the number of the vertices as each vertex is written in a separate record.

The header record has the following format:

Bytes	Length	Type	Contents
1-10	10	Integer	Link-ID (see RAILLINK.DAT)
11-20	10	Real	Node-ID, From-node (see RAILNODE.DAT)
21-30	10	Real	Node-ID, To-node (see RAILNODE.DAT)
31-35	5	Integer	Number of vertex coordinate pairs following

The records containing the vertex coordinates have the following format:

Bytes	Length	Type	Contents
1-10	10	Integer	X coordinate (m)
11-20	10	Integer	Y coordinate (m)

© 2002 IRPUD