MARATHON aims at extracting the maximum productivity from the existing rail infrastructure for producing efficiency, reducing operating costs and attracting new traffic to rail.This represents a market requirement for producing efficiency, reducing operating costs and attracting new traffic to rail. In fact, due to its fragmentation, the railway system efficiency is created through harmonisation and standardisation of the operating rules generating uniformity in the EU Rail Freight space as far as allowed by the existing infrastructure. In pursuing this overall objective the fast implementation of technologies and business solutions capable of delivering operational and visible cost effective results, is a fundamental improvement.MARATHON project is scheduled to prove a business case by demonstrating the effectiveness of the introduction up to market uptake of longer and heavier trains on a selected high-volume Trans European freight corridor. This would be achieved taking into account that the upgrade of the maximum speed for freight trains on currently constrained line sections up to 100/120 km/h with old or new generation wagons secures better trains’ paths for improved service performance. In fact, the bundling of volumes combining conventional and intermodal traffic whenever applicable between large scale terminals/hubs/yards is expected to generate the critical mass to foster the industrialized production of advanced rail freight services. This would be supported by the ability to rejuvenate the system by adopting management, booking, trains priorities and emergency management tools.MARATHON would become an example for an extension to other part of the EU network contributing to create an agreed EU standard, facilitating the adoption of recognised Safety Rules and a step change towards achieving greater effectiveness on Rail Tracks delivering the EU citizens the ultimate results of improving the use of an environment friendly transport modality.