UIC also participated in the GCU anniversary in Rotterdam and was pleased to see that this General Contract of Use for Wagons (GCU), a multilateral contract based on the international convention COTIF 1999 and Annex CUV, is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, and that it has grown to an impressive network of more than 600 signatories across 20 countries, with more than 600,000 wagons currently declared in the GCU wagon database.

UIC, together with ERFA (European Rail Freight Association) and UIP (Association
of independent wagon keepers) is a founding member of the GCU, a contract under private law which has been applied since June 2006 by more than 600 railway Undertakings and Wagon Keepers and which makes obsolete bi- or multilateral contracts with regard to the use (and transfer between two Railway Undertakings) of freight wagons.

UIC is actively involved in the development of the GCU and its main technical appendices (conditions for the technical transfer inspection of wagons and corrective and preventive maintenance).

Nicolas Czernecki, one of the two chairmen of GCU, gave a speech on 22 June in Rotterdam, during the 10th anniversary of GCU.

This video explains what GCU is: