Availability analysis of railway track circuits

Abstract

Railways are expected to operate with ever increasing availability. The availability of railway systems and subsystems influences the overall operational availability. As the track circuit is a key component of railway signalling and control, it can contribute significantly to the loss of availability of the railway system. One way to increase the availability of the track circuit is by implementing a proper maintenance policy. In this article, Petri-nets have been used to develop models for availability analysis of the track circuit for both time-based and condition-based maintenance. A sensitivity analysis has been performed to estimate the effect of maintenance parameters on availability performance using cost-benefit analysis.