Shared Rail Corridor Adjacent Track Accident Risk Analysis

Safety is a high priority for any rail system. There are several safety concerns associated with operating passenger and freight trains on shared-use rail corridors (SRC). Adjacent track accident (ATA) is one of the most important concerns. ATA mainly refers to a train accident scenario where derailed equipment intrudes on adjacent tracks, causing operation disturbance and potential subsequent train collisions on the adjacent tracks. Other ATA scenarios include collisions between trains on adjacent tracks (raking), turnouts and railroad crossings. Limited literature is available that addresses the risk of ATA for shared-use rail corridors. This study presents a comprehensive risk assessment to identify and quantify the effect of factors affecting the likelihood and consequence of ATA. A discussion on how these factors affect the probability and consequence is provided. A semi-quantitative risk analysis model is developed to evaluate the ATA risk incorporating various factors affecting train accident rate, intrusion rate, train presence rate, and accident consequences. A case study with a hypothetical railroad network is presented to illustrate the potential application of the risk model. This research intends to depict a high-level overview of adjacent track accident risk and provides a basis for future quantitative risk analyses and risk mitigation.

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