Centre forms key part of £106m boost for UK Rail Research and Development
Centre of Excellence for Railway Through-Life Engineering - artist's impression
The University of Birmingham, supported by Siemens Mobility, has been awarded £15 million by the UK Research Partnership Investment Fund (UKRPIF) to establish a new world-leading railway research and innovation centre at Goole in the East Riding of Yorkshire.
The UKRPIF investment will enable the University of Birmingham, working with the University of Huddersfield, to establish a new Centre of Excellence for Railway Through-Life Engineering in Goole alongside the major new Siemens Mobility train manufacturing facility, due to open in 2024.
“Research and innovation plays a crucial role in modernising our railways and ensuring it's fit for the future. "I'm delighted to see the University of Birmingham and its world-leading academics leading the way in this space. This significant investment will help to create the right environment to develop the cutting-edge technology we need on the rail network to support more modern, reliable journeys."
The funding is part of £30m announced through the UKRPIF to establish two new world-leading railway research and innovation facilities, with the other being a new Centre of Excellence for Railway Testing, Validation and Customer Experience in South Wales.
The successful funding bid includes a wider commitment from the rail industry to co-invest £60m, with a further £16m being invested by the University of Birmingham. In total the package represents a £106m boost for UK research and development.
We are delighted to continue and strengthen our relationship with Siemens Mobility both as one of the lead partners for the University of Birmingham and UKRRIN. With the new factory and centre of excellence underway we are determined to build, grow, and innovate the UK railway system.
The new Centre of Excellence for Railway Through-Life Engineering in Goole will be located next to the Rail Accelerator for Innovation Solutions and Enterprise (RaisE) business centre and within the major new Siemens Mobility rail village.
This Centre will provide cutting-edge facilities to support the build, service, maintenance, and modernisation of railway rolling stock with a focus on robotics, sensing, and automation.
The Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE) at the University of Birmingham is Europe’s largest specialist railway research, education, and innovation centre; BCRRE is the lead institution for the UK Rail Research and Innovation Network (UKRRIN) and leads the UKRRIN Centre of Excellence in Digital Systems that works on the development and application of digital technologies for the railway. It will now also lead the Centre of Excellence in Railway Testing, Validation and Customer Experience.
UKRRIN offers industry access to purpose built world leading facilities and skills in a range of areas to support research, development and innovation for new technologies and products. It creates powerful collaboration between academia and industry, providing step-changes in innovation in railway and accelerating new technologies and products from research into market applications globally.
This new facility brings together the already established UKRRIN network and the SME community already based at RaisE with academic research and innovation alongside rail manufacturing. This next step continues the pathway to deliver the rail village vision, benefitting the industry as a whole.
Professor Clive Roberts, BCRRE Director, said: “We are delighted to continue and strengthen our relationship with Siemens Mobility both as one of the lead partners for the University of Birmingham and UKRRIN. With the new factory and centre of excellence underway we are determined to build, grow, and innovate the UK railway system.
“As a global leader in railway research and education, we work with partners across the world to develop their workforce and their technical and operational capabilities and it starts on our doorstep. We champion SMEs and work closely with supply chains to introduce new ideas, new ways of working and cross sector collaboration.
“With this new funding our aim is to have the capabilities and tools for through life engineering from conceptual design all the way to end of life with a focus on robotics, sensing and automation, coinciding with our Centre of Excellence in Digital systems.”
Centre of Excellence for Railway Through-Life Engineering - artist's impression
Sambit Banerjee, MD Siemens Mobility UK Rolling Stock and Customer Services, said: “This is fantastic news, not just for Goole but the rail industry as a whole. Our vision was always much more than just building a train factory, we want to have a full rail village for the industry and to create a lasting skills legacy in Goole. Bringing academia, with the University of Birmingham and University of Huddersfield, and industry together in one site is exactly the kind of opportunity that will continue to foster collaboration and innovation across the UK rail industry as well as support the economy.”
As a founder UKRRIN partner, and host for its Centre of Excellence in Rolling Stock, the University of Huddersfield’s renowned Institute of Railway Research (IRR) is delighted to be working alongside the University of Birmingham and Siemens Mobility in the development of unique capabilities to be sited within the new through life engineering and testing facility at Goole. The venture will provide the perfect springboard to extend the formative work of the Institute’s Smart Rolling Stock Maintenance Research Facility.
Councillor Anne Handley, leader of East Riding of Yorkshire Council, welcomed the news of the investment and said: "I am delighted to hear that Goole is one of just two sites in the country that has been chosen to be the home of world-leading railway research and innovation facilities.
"This is an exciting and significant project that will create jobs in the research and development sector, including administration and office roles as well as technical jobs while for the next generation, so those children in primary and secondary school, it will give them the opportunity of a brighter future in innovation and technology in rail."
Professor Paul Allen, Director of the IRR, said: “Railway rolling stock has a long asset life; developing the next generation of automated and smart inspection and maintenance techniques, together with a platform to facilitate a rolling digital and component upgrade cycle throughout a vehicle’s life, is key to reducing cost, improving reliability and ensuring we extract the maximum value from the monetary and carbon investment in new and existing fleets.
"This exciting new academic and industry partnership will help ensure the railway can deliver the innovations needed for sustainable and efficient rolling stock and railway infrastructure operations. We very much look forward to applying our expertise in developing next generation maintenance technologies, extending our collaboration with project partners, and building the capabilities of SMEs and the supply chain to meet the future needs of the rail sector.”
Construction work on the Centre of Excellence for Railway Through-Life Engineering building is expected to begin later this year with the facility set to open in 2025.
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The Rail Accelerator for Innovation Solutions and Enterprise business centre, a collaboration with Siemens Mobility, University of Birmingham and the East Riding of Yorkshire Council, opened in May 2022.
The University of Birmingham is ranked amongst the world’s top 100 institutions. Its work brings people from across the world to Birmingham, including researchers, teachers and more than 6,500 international students from over 150 countries.
BCRRE is part of the University of Birmingham’s School of Engineering and is the largest specialist railway research, education, and innovation centre in Europe. With over 180 academic, research, and professional staff, focused on supporting the global rail industry to thrive by driving cutting-edge research, training the current and next generation of the workforce, and supporting the development and commercialisation of innovative new technologies.
Siemens Mobility is a separately managed company of Siemens AG. As a leader in intelligent transport solutions, Siemens Mobility is constantly innovating its portfolio. Its core areas include rolling stock, rail automation and electrification, a comprehensive software portfolio, turnkey systems as well as related services. With digital products and solutions, Siemens Mobility is enabling mobility operators worldwide to make infrastructure intelligent, increase value sustainably over the entire lifecycle, enhance passenger experience and guarantee availability. In fiscal year 2022, which ended on September 30, 2022, Siemens Mobility posted revenue of €9.7 billion and had around 38,200 employees worldwide.
The Institute of Railway Research (IRR) is part of the University of Huddersfield’s School of Computing and Engineering. The IRR is world-class centre for railway engineering research, development and technology innovation. Our work has helped protect the railway’s most critical assets, de-risking design and reducing operating and maintenance costs, whilst increasing reliability and safety. In 2019 the IRR was awarded the Queen’s Anniversary Prize “for research and development that has brought significant improvements to the railway industry.”
The IRR hosts the UK Rail Research and Innovation Network’s (UKRRIN) Centre of Excellence in Rolling Stock, and with over £14m invested in state-of-the-art laboratory facilities, we work alongside our industrial and academic partners to deliver high-impact research across a range of engineering disciplines. Looking to the future, the IRR is applying the latest techniques in robotic automation, data science and remote condition monitoring, supporting the rail industry in developing the next generation of rolling stock and infrastructure maintenance solutions.
Siemens Mobility is a separately managed company of Siemens AG. As a leader in intelligent transport solutions for more than 175 years, Siemens Mobility is constantly innovating its portfolio. Its core areas include rolling stock, rail automation and electrification, a comprehensive software portfolio, turnkey systems as well as related services. With digital products and solutions, Siemens Mobility is enabling mobility operators worldwide to make infrastructure intelligent, increase value sustainably over the entire lifecycle, enhance passenger experience and guarantee availability. In fiscal year 2022, which ended on September 30, 2022, Siemens Mobility posted revenue of €9.7 billion and had around 38,200 employees worldwide.
Professor of Railway Systems
Staff profile for Clive Roberts, Professor of Railway Systems at the University of Birmingham.
