Proceedings 2002/2003 - IRSE

138
Younger Members’ Section
The Younger Members have been continuing to
organise events for the benefit of those less familiar
with the signalling and telecommunications industry,
while also considering how best to provide for the
needs of the Institution’s younger members in the
future.
In September the latest in the series of half-day
equipment seminars was organised at Canary
Wharf, London, on the subject of Railway Control
Systems. The event started by comparing the functionality,
interfaces and architecture of a typical
metro control system to those of UK mainline control
systems. From these presentations the delegates
could conclude that metro and mainline systems are
fundamentally similar, although both have evolved to
meet the requirements of the different environments.
The next stage of evolution for mainline control
systems was summarised as a movement towards
greater integration – a development that has been
led by metro systems. It was remarked that technically
almost anything is possible to implement in
software. The real challenges relate to the operational
procedures for integrated systems and larger
geographical areas, incident management and
failure/fallback strategies, and the development and
safety assurance of these complex systems. A
presentation on human factors followed, providing
an opportunity to remind the delegates of how the
decisions made by system designers affect the end
users – the operators. It was noted that often
overlooked considerations such as the positioning of
control centre windows and the control of room
temperature should not be forgotten in the design
and development phase as such issues affect the
ability of the operators to carry out their duties. The
event concluded with presentations providing an
overview of two current projects – the London
Underground train identification and management
information systems (TIMIS) project and the renewal
of the control system at Glasgow Central. Both
presentations looked at how additional functionality
can be added to existing railways to improve the
management of the service.
The Younger Members continue to organise worth
while events. A day entitled “ASPECT Survival Kit”
will precede the ASPECT international conference to
help explain the key concepts to be covered in the
conference and help delegates to note them in their
professional development record.
The Younger Members’ Committee held a brainstorming
afternoon this year to generate ideas of
how to ensure that the Institution’s younger
members continue to be offered events to help them
develop their understanding of signalling and
telecommunications. It was recognised that the
current organisation of the Committee is challenged
both geographically and by the effort each member
is able to contribute. A proposal is being worked up
to better incorporate the Younger Members’ events
with the activities of the Institution as a whole.
Council has welcomed this initiative. Contact has
been made with chairmen of all Institution committees,
regional sections and international sections
to introduce this proposal and seek younger
member representatives from each committee or
section to help plan consistent, quality events that
will be accessible to all the Institution’s younger
members.
In addition, the Younger Members have
maintained their association with the Young
Engineers’ Forum – a meeting of Younger Member
representatives from throughout the engineering
institutions. This year the Institute Mining, Minerals
and Materials hosted the forum for the purpose of
sharing ideas of how to organise younger members’
activities. The IRSE Younger Members contributed
by giving a presentation on its activities, the
challenges encountered and solutions proposed.
In summary, the Younger Members are pleased
with what their efforts have achieved this year and
remain hopeful for the future.
K Goodhand
Secretary