ITS World Congress 2021 organised in the Hanseatic city of Hamburg this year had a big success being one of the first face-to-face events of this size in some time with more than 13,200 participants from 66 different countries. Many Special Interest Sessions and Technical Paper Sessions alongside Plenary Meetings and many sessions from the High-level Programme were held where one of the six predetermined congress topics was discussed. FENIX had a busy schedule during the Congress with a dedicated SIS, a presentation at a TP, and the FENIX General Assembly.

FENIX had a busy schedule at the Congress with a full SIS session, a presentation on Technical Paper session, and the General Assembly. During SIS 91, consortium members NeoGLS, ETP-Alice, the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water management, P&G Belgium, PTV Group and a representative from DG MOVE of European Commission talked about the importance of the connectivity and unity FENIX Network offers and demonstrated the use cases on trial sites. You can find the presentations here under Presentations.

Eusebiu Catana, Senior Manager at ERTICO presented the FENIX project and its goals and achievements so far during the Technical Paper Session 19.

FENIX also had a light-box at the ERTICO Stand in the Exhibition Hall where a postcard was also distributed.

On Wednesday morning, FENIX General Assembly took off with participants attending both in person and online. Trial plans have been consolidated and decisions to move forwards have been taken. Here are the main takeaways from the General Assembly:

FENIX will develop and implement a European Federated Network of Information exchange in Future Logistics by integrating different platforms. The purpose of this approach is to increase the willingness of the logistics companies to take electronic data interchange into use, to accelerate information system development processes and to decrease costs of information system integration by creating a common international recommendation for exchanging information. The aim of FENIX is also to decrease the needs of logistics companies to create their own specifications that are not compatible with the universal message standards. Another aim is to speed up adoption of new ways to exchange information between logistics companies and also to insure and improve competitiveness of the logistics companies.

FENIX will support the development, validation and deployment of digital information systems along the EU transport Core Network and notably corridors. The focus is on the implementation of “corridor information systems” according to specific objective 8: “upon the DTLF achievements built a federated network of information exchange platforms, involving both public authorities and business stakeholders”. The compelling enablers to address these demands are technology innovations such as: Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data, Data Integration, Data Analytics, Data Products, Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and new satellite navigation technologies; linked to new business models by creating opportunities to conceive, form and deploy new corridor management systems. Multimodal planners linked to execution control have been recognised as key enablers of future logistics operations. Numerous EU research projects have produced innovative solutions in demonstrator chains. To increase the efficiency of the TEN-T Core Network Corridors, it is mandatory to encourage the development of an integrated trans-European network. Many EU Member States (MS) are now in the phase of further extending their ITS systems services thanks to upgraded equipment and new technologies. Other MS are facing the early stages of ITS deployment and need to make substantial investments in order to secure the efficient operation of their road transport network. In the context of moving to multimodality and to its dynamic version, i.e. synchromodality, the industry is emphasising collaborative planning approaches, which involve multiple partners in collaborative planning and forecasting.

The FENIX Activities are strongly linked and related with all 9 TEN-T corridors, based on DTLF recommendations (DTLF Plenary June 2018), give the answer to the CEF 2018-priority 3.2.2 Objective 8 Call and provide a solid background to integrate all 4 Motorways of the Sea.  FENIX will be tested in 11 pilots sites across of 9 countries in IT(2 pilots), BE(2 pilots), FR, GE, SP, AU, GR, NL, SK.

FENIX will also contribute:

• Accelerate deployment of T&L corridor information services development and increase safety, comfort and efficiency, Testing new T&L services across TEN-T corridors and the FENIX architecture, Interoperability of the systems, Cooperation with other EU T&L pilot projects.Harmonisation: incentive to implement European standards, Cross-fertilization: collaboration and best practice exchanges with DTLF, Extension from DTLF recommendations, Promotion of European standards, technology and expertise to other regions of the world, Contribution to standard development and harmonization across world regions.
• Lead to a synchronized and harmonized deployment between all stakeholders involved: it is expected that the results of the FENIX project lead to a synchronized and harmonized deployment between all stakeholders involved in the corridor information system from the infrastructure, telecom and T&L industry. The study results serve as important input for the decision on the deployment of T&L corridor information services and is also a contribution to the future DTLF recommendations (Brussels, June 2018), the implementation of the ITS Directive and the EU DG MOVE C-ITS platform. The project can also be regarded as a strategic ‘tool’ for the roll-out and real testing of T&L corridor information services across TEN-T European countries.”