21.03.14
The rail engineers of tomorrow get inspired at iRail 2014
School and college students experienced what a career in the rail industry could be like at the fifth iRail event at the Derby Roundhouse yesterday.
The interactive day, now a firmly-established annual event, saw engineering students from Derby College and then younger schoolchildren compete in teams to come up with solutions to railway problems.
The schools also visited Bombardier and Network Rail’s East Midlands Control Centre to find out more about the industry.
iRail 2014 began with a ‘Business Breakfast’ for about 50 political, business and educational leaders from the local area, themed around ‘encouraging young people into rail engineering’, and it ended with the ‘Distinguished Lecture’, this year given by Network Rail chairman Richard Parry-Jones.
Rail companies and organisations from around Derby and the wider industry exhibited on the day, interacting with the students and ‘donating’ staff to help out as mentors to the teams, who were split into two strands, one looking at the railway infrastructure and one at rolling stock. The event was designed to fit in with Derby 175, this year’s celebrations of 175 years since the railway industry came to Derby, by looking back at what’s come before and the innovations that made today’s railways possible, but also looking to the future.
iRail chairman Dave Saunders, speaking after the schoolchildren’s visits to Bombardier and the control centre, said: “They’ve now seen signalling in 2014, and how a vehicle gets made in 2014, but we’ve also gone back to when it all first started – showing them how signalling used to be, for example, using men with flags stood on the platform. We’re showing them how it’s all developed through the years.”
The pupils’ solutions to the railway challenges were occasionally outlandish, but often showed real inspiration and invention – and a big focus on computerisation and driverless technology. Ideas included multi-storey track designs, satellite-controlled trains, anti-bacterial seats, on-board seatbelts, talking ‘smart’ trains, obstacle detection lasers, and much more. By the end of the day, many of the students had railway terminology tripping off their tongues – from GSM-R and ERTMS to carbon fibre composite bodyshells and smart ticketing.
The winners of the two strands for the schools category were West Park School and Bemrose School, both of whom will go forward to the Gen Y Rail national final at Network Rail’s Westwood facility at Coventry. Gen Y Rail is run by RTM’s charity, the UK Rail Industry Training Trust, and you can find out much more about it here.
West Park School was judged the overall winner on the day. Science teacher Philip Mutch told RTM: “It’s been a fantastic day – it’s really been an eye-opener for the school and for the pupils, to see what goes on in railway engineering. It helps them work on their problem-solving, and they’ve really benefitted from it. It’s lovely that all these people give up their time to promote their work to the engineers of tomorrow.”
The pupils RTM talked to were no less enthusiastic, including 13-year-old Tom Cripps, who said he couldn’t believe the opportunities on offer in rail. He said: “It was a brilliant day, and really showed just how much stuff there is going on in the rail industry. There’s more than just driving trains, getting on and off. It showed us what happens on the inside of the industry.”
His teammates Harriet Brown (14), Elliott Wilson (14) and Ellie Fooks (14) said the visits to Bombardier and the control centre were “really interesting…we definitely learnt a lot we didn’t know”, while Imogen Rea (13) added: “It was something different. I’ve never really been interested in trains before, but today changed that. It was good to see what everyone did, and to understand all the work that goes into it.”
Thanks to funding support from the UK Rail Industry Training Trust, the British Science Association awarded CREST Discovery Award certificates to all of the students taking part on the day.
iRail itself is funded by the industry, and also gets third-party funding. Saunders said: “We’re delighted that the industry is getting more involved. We’re becoming more and more reliant on their generosity, as the third-party funding dries up. We remain eternally grateful to people like the Transport iNet and the East Midlands Development Agency (emda), as was, because without their help in the early years, we wouldn’t be here today with the industry now having more of an opportunity to contribute. There’s certainly an appetite within the industry now to fund this, which is good news.”
He also thanked the Young Railway Professionals (YRP), many of whose members helped out by mentoring on the day.
Among the exhibitors were graduate engineers from Interfleet, Arthur Mallins and Emma Taylor. Taylor, who recently completed a Mechanical Engineering degree at Nottingham, did two summer placements with Interfleet. Discussing iRail, she said: “It’s great that they’re trying to get younger people excited about engineering, about maths and science. At school, it can seem a bit dry to some of the students, but showing them what they could do with it afterwards is really important.”
Mallins, who studied Mechanical Engineering at Sheffield, is originally from London but said Derby is “the place to be” for railway careers.
Vossloh Kiepe was among the companies at iRail for the first time. Customer services manager Andy Slater said: “This is the future. There’s a massive skills shortage in the industry, so we need apprentices at all levels, from engineering apprentices up to the graduate level. This event is encouraging the young engineers of tomorrow.”
The judges on the day included Colin Scott, Peter Stanton, Dave Horton, Georgette Hall, and Marian Molloy, while other exhibitors and supporters included RVEL, Network Rail, NSARE, Atkins, Derby College, Porterbrook, Bombardier, the RAIB, the Derby Railway Engineering Society, the IMechE, ESG and LH (part of Wabtec Group). RTM’s Roy Rowlands was also among the exhibitors, telling the students and teachers about the national Gen Y Rail events and the UK Rail Industry Training Trust.
For full coverage of the event, including Parry-Jones’ speech, input from Atkins senior systems engineer Joe Silmon, Brush Traction technical director Simon Evans, Network Rail HR manager Marian Molloy, QSS Group managing director Allan Jones, event manager Paul Jones of By Design Group and many more of the people who helped make iRail 2014 happen, see the April/May 2014 edition of Rail Technology Magazine. Subscribe here: www.railtechnologymagazine.com/subscribe
