A Scheduling Technique for the Most Efficient Train Diagram at a Station

Abstract

In high-density railroad sections such as metropolitan commuter lines, there is a great demand for increasing train density in order to relieve traffic congestion. However, it becomes more difficult to shorten train headway, which is dependent on the performance of the signaling system and the rolling stock, as the track form, train type, and train performance become more diverse. Therefore, making diagrams needs the expertise of skilled specialists, for train scheduling, operation adjustment, and equipment design. In order to raise the train density to a maximum, this paper aims to calculate the restrictions in the train intervals that exist between all trains within a certain accuracy and derive a train diagram. We propose the “maximum-density diagram" to refer to a diagram whose periodic time is shortest, on the assumption that the actions of the operated trains in one period are fixed. In practice, we obtain the effective results for railroad operation practices, when we derive the “maximum-density diagrams" of model cases.