The 12th meeting of the UIC Covid-19 Task Force was attended remotely on 22 September 2020 by almost 60 participants from across the globe.
Marc Guigon, Chair of the Task Force, welcomed the participants and gave an update on the global situation, the latest figures related to the Task Force members, the latest RAILsilience guidance documents and future publications. He took the opportunity to welcome the newest member to the Task Force, SZCZ (Czech Infrastructure Manager).
A series of interesting presentations were then delivered by representatives from RSSB, EU Healthy Gateways Joint Action and SNCF in collaboration with Smart Flows.
The key themes of the presentations included:
Assessing the risk of Covid-19 transmission on trains (focus on simulations showing risk of infection per journey and per contact)
Supporting ground-crossing modes of transport during the Covid-19 pandemic (focus on preparedness and response to cases of Covid-19 at points of entry in EU member states
Social distancing monitoring in stations (presentation of the Smart Flows software to manage social distancing in railway stations)
Philippe Lorand, UIC Senior Advisor and member of the internal Task Force team, then gave an update on the second estimate of the economic impact of Covid-19. The presentation gave details of passenger and freight losses as well as contrasting situations between regions across the world. Members were also asked to send input for the second estimate guidance document, which is planned to be released some time in October.
Concluding words were given by Marc Guigon, who mentioned the Roadmap for a New Normal Period for Railways and Mobility (a document introduced during the previous meeting), and asked members for their input concerning the impact of the pandemic on railway services, investment and research. Mr Guigon also reminded participants to please send their expectations to the Task Force with regard to their expectations over the next few months.
All guidance documents can be consulted on UIC’s dedicated Covid-19 webpage, which is regularly updated with the latest video, news articles, webinars and other audiovisual material: https://uic.org/covid-19
As a reminder, the Task Force LinkedIn group is open to members. Feel free to join the group and share your thoughts: https://lnkd.in/eEKqfW2
The next Task Force web-conference is scheduled to take place on Tuesday 20 October 2020.