A Study of the Track Degradation Process Related to Changes in Railway Traffic

• Main Authors: Licentiate Thesis, Dan Larsson
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Luleå
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.452.8232; http://epubl.ltu.se/1402-1757/2004/48/LTU-LIC-0448-SE.pdf

ideas have been thought in the area of railway technology. These include thought both by elderly men in grey hair and by youngsters with little or no experience but with a fresh and unrestricted mind. This is a statement based on observations at several railway conferences worldwide. It might seem impolite but is not intended to offend no one. Instead it is meant to be a compliment to a transport technology with its roots in the 17th century (see appendix A) that is still unparalleled in many ways and that has been continuously improved by a lot of enthusiastic people through several generations. This mode of transport is characterised by extremely low energy con-sumption, low environmental impact, capability to carry extreme loads and it has a good safety ranking for passenger transports. In spite of all these advantages there still remains a lot to enhance concerning its effectiveness and efficiency to make it com-petitive to other modes of transport. This licentiate thesis presents new ideas related to railway maintenance. The conclu-sions and the new ideas are based on literature studies, empirical experience from field data and also tests performed during investigations and consequence studies for Banverket (Swedish National Rail Administration) during the time period 1995-2004. The research work has been carried out under the auspices of Luleå Railway Research Centre (JvtC), a centre focussed on making railway maintenance effective and effi-cient.