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Track geometry defect rectification based on track deterioration modelling and derailment risk assessment

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Journal of the Operational Research Society

Abstract

Analysing track geometry defects is critical for safe and effective railway transportation. Rectifying the appropriate number, types and combinations of geo-defects can effectively reduce the probability of derailments. In this paper, we propose an analytical framework to assist geo-defect rectification decision making. Our major contributions lie in formulating and integrating the following three data-driven models: (1) A track deterioration model to capture the degradation process of different types of geo-defects; (2) A survival model to assess the dynamic derailment risk as a function of track defect and traffic conditions; (3) An optimization model to plan track rectification activities with two different objectives: a cost-based formulation (CF) and a risk-based formulation (RF). We apply these approaches to solve the optimal rectification planning problem for a real-world railway application. We show that the proposed formulations are efficient as well as effective, as compared with existing strategies currently in practice.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, Buffalo, NY, USA

    Qing He

  2. IBM T J Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, USA

    Hongfei Li, Debarun Bhattacharjya & Arun Hampapur

  3. IBM Global Business Service, Coppell, TX, USA

    Dhaivat P Parikh

Authors
  1. Qing He
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  2. Hongfei Li
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  3. Debarun Bhattacharjya
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  4. Dhaivat P Parikh
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  5. Arun Hampapur
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Correspondence to Qing He.

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He, Q., Li, H., Bhattacharjya, D. et al. Track geometry defect rectification based on track deterioration modelling and derailment risk assessment. J Oper Res Soc 66, 392–404 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1057/jors.2014.7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/jors.2014.7

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