Evaluation of a risk assessment system for heritage railway earthworks

There are currently over 100 heritage railways in the UK carrying 6.8 million passengers on 15 million passenger journeys and contributing an estimated £579 million to the UK economy. Many of these lines include significant earthworks, which present a considerable risk to their safe operation. In the last decade there have been major slips at several heritage railways causing major disruption to operations and a serious threat to business continuity. This research describes the application of a risk assessment system based on that used by Network Rail but specifically adapted for heritage railway conditions. Adaptations include significant alterations to the consequence categories used in prioritization of earthwork issues and a simple low-cost method of implementation based on paper forms and Excel spreadsheets. Use of the system on two heritage railways, the Bo’ness and Kinneil Railway and the Strathspey Railway is evaluated by means of discussion with railway engineering staff and civil engineering volunteers. It is concluded that whilst the system represents a realistic and useful approach to management of earthwork assets, the system could not be used by heritage railway volunteer staff without targeted training. Such training, however, would be straightforward to provide, perhaps under the auspices of the Heritage Railway Association

Complex delay dynamics on railway networks: from universal laws to realistic modelling

Railways are a key infrastructure for any modern country. The reliability and resilience of this peculiar transportation system may be challenged by different shocks such as disruptions, strikes and adverse weather conditions. These events compromise the correct functioning of the system and trigger the spreading of delays into the railway network on a daily basis. Despite their importance, a general theoretical understanding of the underlying causes of these disruptions is still lacking. In this work, we analyse the Italian and German railway networks by leveraging on the train schedules and actual delay data retrieved during the year 2015. We use {these} data to infer simple statistical laws ruling the emergence of localized delays in different areas of the network and we model the spreading of these delays throughout the network by exploiting a framework inspired by epidemic spreading models. Our model offers a fast and easy tool for the preliminary assessment of the {effectiveness of} traffic handling policies, and of the railway {network} criticalities.Comment: 32 pages (with appendix), 28 Figures (with appendix), 2 Table

Railways competition in a park-and-ride model

It is well understood that the way of use of automobiles within urban areas should be reconsidered for environmental improvements, such as reduction of CO2 or energy itself. In this paper, scale effect of city size and cost advantage of railway over automobiles is examined in a simple setting with so-called Park-and-Ride commuter system. Our results are as follows: The fare per mile charged by a monopoly railway firm may not be relevant to the city size; the fare in a symmetric equilibrium under monopolistic competition is decreasing with the city size; the fare in a symmetric zero-profit kinked equilibrium is increasing with the city size; the fare of social optimum is decreasing with the city size.

High speed short range optical wireless ground-to-train communications

There is a huge demand for seamless high-speed communications in fast moving trains. People want broadband services while on board as in their home or in the workplace. This demand drives the motivation for a high speed dedicated optical wireless link. Here we propose a free space optical ground-to-train communications system which consists of optical transceivers placed on the train and along the railway track. A mathematical model for three different scenarios when the train is moving has been developed. The optical link analysis, results as well as a simple proof of concept are also presented

TRACK-VEHICLE IN-PLANE DYNAMICAL MODEL CONSISTING OF A BEAM AND LUMPED PARAMETER COMPONENTS

This paper deals with the exact mathematical description of a simple in-plane track-vehicle dynamical system model. The railway track is modelled by a beam on damped linear foundation, while the two-axle railway vehicle is modelled by a lumped parameter linear dynamical system. The interaction between the track and the vehicle in vertical plane is described by the Hertzian spring and damper, belonging to the linearized vertical contact force transfer. Formulation of the mathematical models, as well as the closed form solutions for the excitation-free system are presented

The Basic Concepts of Modelling Railway Track Systems Using Conventional and Finite Element Methods

- The classical concepts of railway track analysis, such Beam on Elastic Foundation (BOEF), Winkler\u27s theory or Zimmermann method are categorized as one-dimensional analysis of a railway structure and are simplification of a beam laid on a continuous support (soil\u27s subgrade or foundation). These methods are still very useful for analyzing a simple design and analysis of railway track systems. Unfortunately, for doing a complex analysis of a railway track, these methods have lack of capabilities, since they only take into account one-dimensional system and neglect the actual discrete support provided by crossed sleeper, ballast, sub ballast mat and subgrade.Nowadays, the use of computer software for doing Finite Element Method (FEM) or Finite Element Analysis (FEA) of a structure is very common for engineers. FEA consists of a huge amount of complex calculations; therefore, a manual calculation by hand is almost impossible to be done. Hence, the use of computer software will be very useful in this manner. The applications of FEM using software also widen in the field of railway infrastructure design and analysis. There are many advantages of using FEM method using computer. However, related to its complexities, one should understands the concepts and “knows-how” to solve the problems, to idealize the structure into FEM model in computer, and to choose the suitable elements and its behaviours, and also the correct method.Thispaper is presented to discuss the basic theories behind the conventional and advanced ways of modelling of railway track system, to show the basic concepts of modelling railway track systems using FEM, to present two- and three-dimensional FEM models of railway superstructures which are built using software ANSYS, and to demonstrate the way of doing the verification of the results using Zimmermann method

Real-time traffic control in railway systems

Despite the constantly increasing demand of passengers and goods transport in Europe, the share of railway traffic is decreasing. One major reason appears to be congestion, which in turn results in frequent delays and in a general unreliability of the system. This fact has triggered the study of efficient ways to manage railway traffic, both off-line and real-time, by means of optimization and mathematical programming techniques. And yet, to our knowledge, there are only a few fully automated real-time traffic control systems which are actually in operation in the European railway system; in most cases such systems only control very simple lines and actually they only support the activity of human dispatchers. We describe here two recent optimization based applications to real-time traffic control which have actually been put into operation in the Italian railways. One such system has been able to fully control the trains in the terminal stations of Milano metro system. The other one will be fully operative by the end of 2012, when it will control the trains on several Italian single-track railways. Both systems heavily rely on mixed integer programming techniques to elaborate good quality timetables in real time

Railway interference management: TLM modelling in railway applications

This thesis deals with the application of analytical and numerical tools to Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) management in railways. Analytical and numerical tools are applied to study the electromagnetic coupling from an alternating current (AC) electrified railway line, and to study the electrical properties of concrete structure - a widely used component within the railway infrastructure. An electrified railway system is a complex distributed system consisting of several sub-systems, with different voltage and current levels, co-located in a small area. An analytical method, based on transmissions line theory, is developed to investigate railway electromagnetic coupling. The method is used to study an electrified railway line in which the running rails and earth comprise the current retum path. The model is then modified to include the presence of booster transformers. The analytical model can be used to study the railway current distribution, earth potential and electromagnetic coupling - inductive and conductive coupling - to nearby metallic structures. The limiting factor of the analytical model is the increasing difficulty in resolving the analytical equation as the complexity of the railway model increases. A large scale railway numerical model is implemented in Transmission Line Matrix (TLM) and the electromagnetic fields propagated from the railway model is studied. As this work focuses on the direct application of TLM in railway EMC management, a commercially available TIM software package is used. The limitation of the numerical model relates to the increased computation resource and simulation time required as the complexity of the railway model increases. The second part of this thesis deals with the investigation of the electrical properties of concrete and the development of a dispersive material model that can be implemented in numerical simulators such as TIM. Concrete is widely used in the railway as structural components in the construction of signalling equipment room, operation control centres etc. It is equally used as sleepers in the railway to hold the rails in place or as concrete slabs on which the whole rail lines are installed. It is thus important to understand the contribution of concrete structures to the propagation of electromagnetic wave and its impact in railway applications. An analytical model, based on transmission line theory, is developed for the evaluation of shielding effectiveness of a concrete slab; the analytical model is extended to deal with reinforced concrete slab and conductive concrete. The usefulness and limitation of the model is discussed. A numerical model for concrete is developed for the evaluation of the effectiveness of concrete as a shield. Initially, concrete is modelled as a simple dielectric material, using the available dielectric material functionality within TLM. It is noted that the simple dielectric model is not adequate to characterise the behaviour of concrete over the frequency range of interest. Better agreement is obtained with concrete modelled as a dispersive material having material properties similar to that exhibited by materials obeying Debye equation. The limitations of the dispersive material model are equally discussed. The design of conductive concrete is discussed, these have application in the railway industry where old existing structures are to be converted to functional rooms to house sensitive electronic system. A layer of conductive concrete can be applied to the facade to enhance the global shielding of the structure

Three-dimensional numerical modelling of ballasted railway track foundations for high-speed trains with special reference to critical speed

Due to recent congestion of highways in many countries around the world, railways have become the most popular means of public transportation, which has increased the demand for heavier and faster trains. High speeds and heavy loads of trains are usually accompanied with large vibrations in the train-track-ground system, especially when train speed reaches its critical value, leading to possible train derailment and track damages. This unwanted scenario makes it important for railway geotechnical engineers to investigate the behaviour of ballasted railway track foundations for high-speed trains, with special reference to critical speed. In the current paper, a sophisticated three-dimensional (3D) finite element (FE) modelling was developed to simulate the dynamic response of ballasted railway tracks subjected to train moving loads, and the critical speed was investigated for various train-track-ground system conditions. The results were presented in terms of the evolution of the coefficient of dynamic amplification of sleeper deflection versus train speed, which have been synthesized into simple sensitivity charts that can be used to determine the critical speed corresponding to the conditions of a particular train-track-ground system