LTE network for railway to debut in 2017
The long-term evolution (LTE) mobile telecommunication technology for railway, or LTE-R, will be introduced in Korea in 2017, the state-run railway agency said.
According to the Korea Rail Network Authority (KRNA), last week the LTE-R will be first commercialized for the line connecting Wonju and Gangneung in Gangwon Province, scheduled to open in late 2017.
"The domestic standardization and system unification of LTE-based railway communication will improve the quality of railway service and enable systematic safety management," KRNA Chief Executive Kang Yeong-il said. "It is also expected that we can strengthen global market competitiveness by securing domestic technologies for high-speed railway wireless telecommunication systems."
The authority's plan to commercialize the LTE-R technology came after the Telecommunication Technology Association (TTA) standardized the LTE-based railway communication system powered by domestically developed technologies at its meeting on Dec. 16.
The new network supports high-capacity data transmission even when trains run faster than 350 kilometers per hour and is compatible with train control systems and the public safety LTE network that the government is planning to introduce, the agency said.