Railway safety risk assessment using FRA and FAHP approaches - a case study on risk analysis of shunting at Waterloo depot

Abstract

This article presents a new safety risk assessment methodology for conducting systematic safety risk assessment using fuzzy reasoning approach (FRA) and fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (FAHP). In this method, risk factors are described by frequency of occurrence (FO), consequence severity (CS) and risk level (RL) using linguistic variables. The proposed risk assessment method can evaluate both qualitative and quantitative risk data and information associated with railway operation efficiently and effectively. The outcomes of risk assessment are represented as the risk degrees and the defined risk categories of RLs with a belief of percentage, which provide very useful risk information to risk analysts, managers and engineers. This will provide safety managers with a method and tool to improve their safety management of railway systems and set safety standards. The developed intelligent railway safety risk prediction software system based on the proposed methodology is described in this paper. A case study of risk analysis of shunting at Waterloo depot is used to illustrate the application of the proposed methodology.