Spanish Railways Foundation (FFE)

The Spanish Railways Foundation (FFE) was constituted on 20th February 1985 by Renfe and FEVE as a public non-profit foundation.

FFE’s objectives are to stimulate the knowledge, awareness and use by society of railway transport; promote transport and training regarding; and ensure the safekeeping of material assets and railway documents of historical or artistic value.

Its Board of Trustees gathers the most important agents of the Spanish Railway Sector, bringing together all the Spanish national and regional railway operators and infrastructure managers and also some urban metro operators.

In terms of Research and Scientific Collaboration, FFE promotes the internationalization of the Spanish Rail Sector and provides a consistent framework for the R&D and innovation efforts through the Technical Secretariat of the Spanish Railways Technological Platform (PTFE) which gathers more than 350 entities.

In relation to Research Activities, FFE counts with a multidisciplinary group of researchers with more than 25 years of activity in railway research, organized in four research groups -transport energy and emissions; economics and exploitation of transport; geography and rail traffic; and social dimension and security of transport-, and working very closely together with the technology final users –infrastructure managers and railway undertakings-, giving answer to their needs. This Direction participates in national and international research projects, develops studies, provides very specialized consultancy and advisory services, as well as technological watch and dissemination at national and international level.

-SOCIAL DIMENSION AND SECURITY OF TRANSPORT

Social perception of transport modes; needs of the "future customer“; social intervention on transport modes; market research and product testing; quantitative methods (surveys), qualitative techniques (group dynamics) and demographic and territorial analysis; security.

-TRANSPORT ENERGY AND EMISSIONS

Railway energy efficiency; modelling and calculation of energy and emissions in railways according to vehicle characteristics, services and lines; management of regenerative braking energy and interaction with the electric public network.

-ECONOMICS AND EXPLOITATION OF TRANSPORT

Transaction and external costs of passengers and goods transport; preparation and analysis of indicators, fees and prices for infrastructure use; line and train capacity; functional design-oriented train cost; consumption and ergonomic design; planning of services.

-GEOGRAPHY AND RAIL TRAFFIC

Studies of consistency and performance of railway networks; historical evolution of the network; geographic information systems for railways; study on network features and capabilities.