Fit the locomotives, commission the trackside, write the rules, and ETCS can still stumble on the day a driver decides the old way was better. The technology is the measurable part of an ETCS introduction. The people are the program.

My guest Cara Cohen is an organisational psychologist who worked on business change for the introduction of ETCS at UK freight operator Freightliner, inside the East Coast Digital Programme. This conversation was recorded during her time there; she has since moved to the Rail Delivery Group as People, Change and Projects Specialist for ETCS, so the people side of this rollout continues to be her day job.

We get into what a business change manager actually does, why drivers hesitate to trust the screen and what wins them over, how Level NTC works and why most freight drivers meet it before they ever meet Level 2, why a fitted locomotive is treated as new traction, and the quiet disciplines that keep a change program alive: bite-sized learnings, myth busting, and unions involved from the first human factors session. The conversation closes with Freightliner's decision to take its first-in-class fitment in-house, in partnership with Siemens.

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