Rail is the circulatory system of Asia Pacific (APAC)’s cities. China’s urban rail networks alone recorded 32.2 billion passenger trips in 2024, up 9.5% from the previous year. According to the International Association of Public Transport (UITP), the region accounts for more than half of the urban metro track length in the world and half of global metro ridership. Despite carrying 7% of global passenger-kilometers, rail accounts for just 1% of transport emissions. By almost every measure of scale, growth and sustainability, rail is the backbone of urban mobility in APAC. The question is whether the infrastructure underpinning these networks is keeping pace.
Resilience is a real challenge
Rail networks across APAC are operating under pressures today that did not exist a decade ago. To start, cyber threats are growing in sophistication and increasingly targeting critical infrastructure. Railways, with their complex, interconnected environments, are an attractive target. The region’s dense urban centers continue to expand, putting existing networks under greater strain. The effects of climate change, including more frequent typhoons, flooding and landslides, are forcing operators to plan for disruption as a matter of routine rather than exception.
What unites all these challenges is that they test a rail network’s ability to keep functioning when conditions change rapidly. That is not just an engineering challenge, but also one that the right communications infrastructure must be designed to address, as network outages carry a much higher risk for a rail network that thousands of people rely on.
Modern railway operations depend on integrated communications infrastructure: the backbone that connects everything from signaling to operations, passenger systems and control centers into a coherent whole. During normal operations, that integration drives efficiency: better resource allocation, smoother coordination, and faster and more accurate decision-making. However, the importance of this communications infrastructure becomes most visible when a disruption occurs. Networks with integrated communications and stronger network backbones can diagnose faults faster, coordinate rerouting, and restore normal service more quickly than those that do not have that infrastructure in place.
Building mission-critical, reliable architecture
The foundation of a resilient rail network is an operations control center with real-time visibility across the entire system, not just trains and tracks, but also ground staff, passenger flows, and signaling systems such as communications-based train control (CBTC). Modern API integration allows operators to connect these disparate elements, creating an environment where the system’s components communicate with each other continuously and automatically, underpinned by a converged, high-reliability IP/MPLS communications backbone that ensures critical data flows without delay or disruption.
For example, emergency help points are a common feature on train platforms for passengers and commuters to request help in the event of an emergency, as are cameras in each station. But how often is the latter made available to the person picking up the emergency request from the help point so they can better assess the situation?
This level of integration is what makes advanced technologies genuinely useful. AI-driven analytics, IoT monitoring devices, and automation tools all depend on a common data layer to function effectively. Without integrated communications, these are isolated capabilities. With it, they become a coordinated intelligence layer that enables rail operators to shift from reactive to predictive management, allowing them to quickly catch and address issues before they become failures.
The shift is already underway
The good news is that momentum is building across the region. In markets like Singapore, newer lines have already been designed around converged, IP-based communications backbones from the outset, enabling systems like CBTC, passenger information, and video surveillance to operate on a single, unified network. In more established systems, operators are taking a phased approach to modernization. Seoul, for instance, is upgrading legacy lines to support more integrated, real-time operations, reflecting a broader shift toward converged, high-reliability communications platforms.
For rail operators still relying on legacy communications infrastructure, these examples make the strategic direction clear. The question is no longer whether to modernize, but how to ensure any disruptive overhaul reaps dividends over the next 10 to 20 years.
The opportunity for APAC is significant: rail already carries billions of passengers across the region each year, and networks continue to expand rapidly. By investing in modern, resilient communications platforms today, operators can ensure their networks remain reliable and efficient, not just for the passengers of today, but for the next generation of sustainable urban mobility.
Dirk Dumortier is Director of Vertical Partnerships, APAC, at Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise. He works with organizations and partners across the region on communications and digital transformation initiatives, with experience spanning enterprise communications, cloud and industry-focused technology deployments.
Editor’s note: This contributed article has been lightly edited for clarity, length, and style. Where appropriate, TNGlobal may verify, qualify or omit factual claims that cannot be independently corroborated. The views and arguments expressed remain those of the author.
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