Rail Track Safety Monitoring Technology

This book focuses on selected research problems of contemporary railways. The first chapter is devoted to the prediction of railways development in the nearest future. The second chapter discusses safety and security problems in general, precisely from the system point of view. In the third chapter, both the general approach and a particular case study of a critical incident with regard to railway safety are presented. In the fourth chapter, the question of railway infrastructure studies is presented, which is devoted to track superstructure. In the fifth chapter, the modern system for the technical condition monitoring of railway tracks is discussed. The compact on-board sensing device is presented. The last chapter focuses on modeling railway vehicle dynamics using numerical simulation, where the dynamical models are exploited.

Human errors, as well as deliberate sabotage, pose a considerable danger to passengers riding on the modern railways and have created disastrous consequences. To protect civilians against both intentional and unintentional threats, rail transportation has become increasingly automated. Railway Safety, Reliability, and Security: Technologies and Systems Engineering provides engineering students and professionals with a collection of state-of-the-art methodological and technological notions to support the development and certification of ‘real-time safety-critical’ railway control systems, as well as the protection of rail transportation infrastructures.

Positive train control (PTC) is a communications-based train control system designed to prevent some serious train accidents. Federal law requires passenger and major freight railroads to install PTC on most major routes by the end of 2015. Railroads must address other risks by implementing other technologies. The FRA oversees implementation of these technologies and must report to Congress on progress in implementing PTC. This report discusses railroads' progress in developing PTC and the remaining steps to implement it, the benefits of and challenges in implementing other safety technologies, and the extent of FRA's efforts to fulfill the PTC mandate. Charts and tables. This is a print on demand edition of an important, hard-to-find report.

February issue includes Appendix entitled Directory of United States Government periodicals and subscription publications; September issue includes List of depository libraries; June and December issues include semiannual index

This Research Topic eBook comprises Volume I and Volume II of Best Practices on Advanced Condition Monitoring of Rail Infrastructure Systems.

Dynamics of Coupled Systems in High-Speed Railways: Theory and Practice presents the relationship between various coupled systems that can affect train operation, including interaction between track and train, the pantograph-catenary system and train, power supply system and train, and airflow and train, with respect to the structure and characteristics of high-speed railway. The overall simulation optimization and control are achieved based on an analysis of the dynamics generated by coupled systems in high-speed trains, with a theoretical framework for the dynamics presented in the book. Presents the first book available on the dynamics of coupled systems in high-speed trains Provides a systematic view of high-speed vehicle dynamics, covering the issues that are especially concerned for high speed operations, such as high-speed pantograph and catenary, aerodynamic characteristics and running stability of high-speed trains Covers the optimization of dynamic performance, the design of parameters, the simulation of high-speed train service processes, and the identification of high-speed train state and condition assessment