Evaluating non-functional qualities in railway by applying the quality triage method - A case study

The railway industry is undergoing modernization and development with increasing use of new technology and digitalisation. In addition to physical security requirements, systems need to be secured against cyberattacks from outsiders. In addition, there are other quality requirements like scalability, reliability, availability, and sustainability that need attention. This paper presents results from testing the quality triage method, which has its origin from software development, on railway projects. The quality triage method aims to balance several quality requirements for decision making in development projects. Cybersecurity is an example of these quality requirements. A discussion of cost elements and benefits from applying the method within the railway domain has been outlined. As a main conclusion, the authors see new opportunities of addressing quality requirements more explicitly in projects by applying the quality triage approach to railway projects.publishedVersio

The AQUAS ECSEL Project Aggregated Quality Assurance for Systems: Co-Engineering Inside and Across the Product Life Cycle

There is an ever-increasing complexity of the systems we engineer in modern society, which includes facing the convergence of the embedded world and the open world. This complexity creates increasing difficulty with providing assurance for factors including safety, security and performance. In such a context, the AQUAS project investigates the challenges arising from e.g., the inter-dependence of safety, security and performance of systems and aims at efficient solutions for the entire product life-cycle. The project builds on knowledge of partners gained in current or former EU projects and will demonstrate the newly developed methods and techniques for co-engineering across use cases spanning Aerospace, Medicine, Transport and Industrial Control.A special thanks to all the AQUAS consortium people that have worked on the AQUAS proposal on which this paper is based, especially to Charles Robinson (TRT), the proposal coordinator. The AQUAS project is funded from the ECSEL Joint Undertaking under grant agreement n 737475, and from National funding

Ensuring Cyber-Security in Smart Railway Surveillance with SHIELD

Modern railways feature increasingly complex embedded computing systems for surveillance, that are moving towards fully wireless smart-sensors. Those systems are aimed at monitoring system status from a physical-security viewpoint, in order to detect intrusions and other environmental anomalies. However, the same systems used for physical-security surveillance are vulnerable to cyber-security threats, since they feature distributed hardware and software architectures often interconnected by ‘open networks’, like wireless channels and the Internet. In this paper, we show how the integrated approach to Security, Privacy and Dependability (SPD) in embedded systems provided by the SHIELD framework (developed within the EU funded pSHIELD and nSHIELD research projects) can be applied to railway surveillance systems in order to measure and improve their SPD level. SHIELD implements a layered architecture (node, network, middleware and overlay) and orchestrates SPD mechanisms based on ontology models, appropriate metrics and composability. The results of prototypical application to a real-world demonstrator show the effectiveness of SHIELD and justify its practical applicability in industrial settings

The implementation of the national passenger rail plan on priority corridors

Research presented for the degree of Masters of Management in Public Policy to the faculty of Commerce, Law and Management of the University of the Witwatersrand, School of Governance March 2017The National Rail Passenger Plan was approved by the Cabinet of South Africa in 2006, as a blueprint to arrest the decline of passenger rail in the country. This was developed at the backdrop of the consolidation of the rail entities where passenger and freight rail will be separately managed. South Africa’s passenger rail system was underpinned by years of underinvestment. South Africa has experienced the terminal decline pertaining to the market share in passenger rail. The entire rail assets i.e. both above rail and below rail were in a state of collapse and as such the national passenger rail plan was therefore a right intervention. The approach of the plan was to position rail transport as one of the key mode for public transport solutions. The Priority Corridors strategy was introduced as method to target the focused implementation methodology. The strategy approach was to look at corridors with high ridership in order to have an impact. Around 2.2 million, mainly low income, working people use the commuter network everyday to access employment opportunities. The focus of the research study was to understand the progress which has been made with regard to this strategic intervention. Critical is to understand what are the shortcomings that impede the implementation of national passenger rail plan in South Africa. To answer this question, the study focused on the documentary analysis and interviews as part of the data collection methodology. The findings of the study were able to demonstrate on which aspect of the strategic infrastructure investments projects were implemented in priority corridors. Some of the aspects which have been implemented include track rehabilitation, new signal equipment and station upgrades in priority corridors. However, there were challenges that were experienced during the implementation. The study findings revealed that funding of the programme implementation is one of shortcomings that delayed the implementation of the national rail plan. Other findings include the lack of capacity and technical skills; and lack of leadership in implementing the strategic projects in the priority corridors. The study recommends that for sustainable rail operations, funding should be mobilised, Prasa structure should be realigned and the rail regulatory framework should be finalised.MT 201

Overview of Infrastructure Charging, part 4, IMPROVERAIL Project Deliverable 9, “Improved Data Background to Support Current and Future Infrastructure Charging Systems”

Improverail aims are to further support the establishment of railway infrastructure management in accordance with Directive 91/440, as well as the new railway infrastructure directives, by developing the necessary tools for modelling the management of railway infrastructure; by evaluating improved methods for capacity and resources management, which allow the improvement of the Life Cycle Costs (LCC) calculating methods, including elements related to vehicle - infrastructure interaction and external costs; and by improving data background in support of charging for use of railway infrastructure. To achieve these objectives, Improverail is organised along 8 workpackages, with specific objectives, responding to the requirements of the task 2.2.1/10 of the 2nd call made in the 5th RTD Framework Programme in December 1999.This part is the task 7.1 (Review of infrastructure charging systems) to the workpackage 7 (Analysis of the relation between infrastructure cost variation and diversity of infrastructure charging systems).Before explaining the economic characteristics of railway and his basic pricing principles, authors must specify the objectives of railways infrastructure charging.principle of pricing ; rail infrastructure charging ; public service obligation ; rail charging practice ; Europe ; Improverail

Transport 2040 : analysis of technical developments in transport - maritime, air, rail and road

A number of technical and socio-technical factors are driving the development and adoption of automation. The report, Transport 2040: Automation, Technology, Employment – The Future of Work, provided an overview of the most important trends forecasted to affect the global transport sector by 2040. This current report provides additional details of that assessment. The research conducted is guided by a transport-technology analytical model that provides a structure for a systematic review across different modes of transport. This report reviews, in particular, the transportation technology through the lens of transport vehicles (e.g. ships, trucks, trains, aircraft) and the technical infrastructure that is needed for the operation of the vehicle (e.g. waterways and harbours, roads, railway tracks and freight terminals, as well as controlled airspace and airports).https://commons.wmu.se/lib_reports/1076/thumbnail.jp