European Railway Platform

The European Railway Platform (ERP) is a new market‑side body based on the Regulation on the use of railway infrastructure capacity (“Capacity Regulation”). It is foreseen as the counterpart, representing the market, to the European Network of Infrastructure Managers (ENIM), with a mandate support operational stakeholders other than infrastructure managers at the European level and to provide consolidated input on capacity and traffic management, performance review and related technical standards. 

Forum Train Europe (FTE) coordinates the preparation of the ERP proposal that will be submitted to the European Commission once the Capacity Regulation enters into force. FTE leads this work in close cooperation with ALLRAIL, ERFA, CER, UIRR and other associations, together with representatives of other operational stakeholders such as ports, service facilities and public service obligation (PSO) authorities. Through this joint effort, FTE and its partners aim to deliver an ERP set‑up that meets the legal requirements of the Capacity Regulation while fully aligning with stakeholders’ expectations on representation, governance and day‑to‑day functioning.

Stakeholders expect ERP to be inclusive, transparent and effective in practice, not just on paper. They want a platform that genuinely reflects the diversity of operational stakeholders, avoids unnecessary bureaucracy and costs, and is able to deliver timely, strong, unified and well‑founded positions in the often-tight consultation timelines of ENIM. A central goal of the current design work is therefore to ensure that ERP’s composition, rules of procedure and working methods closely match these expectations, so that the platform is both representative and operationally efficient. Therefore, the ERP is designed as a lean and inclusive platform that organises consultations and gives operational stakeholders a single, structured voice in the Capacity Regulation framework.