COMPUTER ASSISTED REVISION OF INFRASTRUCTURE MAINTENANCE POLICY

Delft University of Technology (Netherlands), since 1998, has developed and used a Decision-Support System (DSS) to analyze the long-term impacts of railway design and maintenance decisions. The DSS combines data of construction, maintenance and operating, and financing processes in order to make estimates of total life cycle costs. Infrastructure performance is included in these estimates. DSS design and application, in a revision of the renewal policy for tracks and switches on the Dutch network, are presented. The DSS proved to be a valuable tool for testing the robustness of design and maintenance decisions and focusing the discussion on the important cost-driving factors.