Transport Research Laboratory (TRL)
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Rail Infrastructure
Rail infrastructure, encompassing track, structures, earthworks and buildings, needs to provide increasing capacity and improved resilience, while reducing costs in future control periods. The Rail Technology Strategy includes designing in tolerance for natural hazards and unforeseen occurrences, and modernising asset inspection, assessment and maintenance in its vision for future railway infrastructure.
Most popular related searches
infrastructure inspection
remediation management
risk assessment
asset maintenance
sustainability management
TRL is working with UK`s Department for Transport, RSSB and Future Railway to promote the uptake of innovative methods in the railway sector. Our technical expertise, including sustainability, measurement technology, asset management and human factors, can be applied successfully to a wide range of problems.
For example we have:
- Evaluated the suitability of retro-reflective signing materials for rail signals to help minimise the risk of driver error through failure to respond to mandatory signs
- Developed a methodology to determine whether, given the range of future predicted climate scenarios, it would be cost effective to comprehensively stabilise vulnerable earthworks rather than adopt a reactive, remedial approach to structural failures
- Investigated the visual strategies used by train drivers, and the cognitive processes underlying them, to inform the design of signal sighting times
- Incorporated risk based assessment methods into inspection regimes for bridges, resulting in a more focussed and efficient inspection regime.