Distance Trains Research Articles

Public Service Innovation Through the Implementation of the E-Boarding Pass System on Long Distance Trains at PT. Indonesian Railways (Persero)

This article aims to find out how to innovate the implementation of the e-boarding pass system at PT. Kereta Api Indonesia (Persero) whether delivered well to train users or not, until they switch from conventional ticket printing to ticket printing system via e-boarding pass with smartphone. The problem is focused on the e-boarding pass system which the author considers very innovative in utilizing technology that is growing every year, especially services must think how they optimize their services, one of which is by utilizing technology in changing the old system that is considered irrelevant to use and there are always problems in it by overhauling certain aspects such as purchasing and printing tickets manually through tellers are being changed to online based system ranging from purchasing or printing tickets. To approach the problem of the author using a theoretical reference from Cresswell by using a type of qualitative research that is a literature study that uses books and other literature as the main object, because the author uses literature research then the data obtained through books and literature that supports research. This paper concludes that policy innovations in the implementation of the e-boarding pass system whether it goes as expected.

An optimization model to assign seats in long distance trains to minimize SARS-CoV-2 diffusion.

The unprecedented spread of SARS-CoV-2 has pushed governmental bodies to undertake stringent actions like travel regulations, localized curfews, curb activity participation, etc. These restrictions assisted in controlling the proliferation of the virus; however, they severely affected major economies. This compels policymakers and planners to devise strategies that restrain virus spread as well as operationalize economic activities. In this context, we discuss some of the potential implications of seat inventory management in long-distance passenger trains and create a balance between operators’ operational efficiency and passengers’ safety. The paper introduces a novel seat assignment policy that aims to mitigate virus diffusion risk among passengers by reducing interaction among them. A mixed-integer linear programming problem has been formulated that concomitantly maximizes the operator’s revenue and minimizes virus diffusion. The validity of the model has been tested using real-life data obtained from Indian Railways. The computational results show that a mere 50% capacity utilization may distress operators’ economics and prove ineffectual in controlling SARS-CoV-2 transmission. The proposed model produces encouraging results in restricting virus diffusion and improving revenue even under 100% capacity utilization.

Development of the system of rationing and accounting for performance indicators of long distance and commuter train schedules for railways and the network as a whole

Currently, rationing and accounting of performance indicators for long distance and commuter train timetables for railways is carried out on the basis of the principle of achieved level. Methodology for calculating indicators based on objective conditions for organizing operational work on each railway has been developed. The generalized indicator characterizing the objective conditions is determined by the authors on the basis of an analysis of a set of factors, which include: loading of the railway infrastructure by train traffic; technical and technological state of infrastructure and rolling stock; risks associated with a possible delay of trains during the period of providing windows for the repair and reconstruction of infrastructure devices; number of passenger train stops; climatic conditions; technological discipline for fulfilling the traffic schedule (it is assumed to be the same for all railways); risks of violation of timetables on lines with dense train traffic. Dependencies for determining the numerical values of the factors are proposed. Taking into account the weight coefficients of each factor, the estimated indices of the objective conditions of the operation of each railway for long distance and commuter traffic are determined. The network task by the level of execution of schedules is distributed by railways in proportion to the values of their estimated indices. The transition to the proposed system of rationing and accounting for the performance of timetables will help to improve the quality of performance of the train schedule, to ensure a positive image of the Russian Railways in the field of passenger transportation. The use of the proposed methodology for determining the target indicators of the schedules of long distance and commuter trains ensures that the real conditions of the transportation process on each railway are taken into account at the planning stage and allows an objective assessment of the quality of the organization of operational work based on the results of the fulfillment of planned targets.

The geographical distribution of passenger railway hubs in Russia

The geographical distribution of 550 passenger railway nodes that are serving longer distance trains were studied. It’s containing 622 stations, which encompass more than 97% of passenger departures total number on the railway in 2016 were selected and grouped according to its size and the main nodes’characteristics were analyzed. Studying dependence of node’s rank and size from number of people, which live in its area, revealed that the less population size center is, the more other factors influence. The factual and ideal Zipf’s curve for the hierarchy of railway nodes were analyzed and its discrepancy was identified. An excessive role of Moscow as a main node and of Saint Petersburg as the second center is a feature in the hierarchy of nodes. This research also represents the analysis of nodes’ upper groups (more than 250 000 passenger departures per year). Spatial distribution of passenger railway nodes on the territory of Russia is descripted and the similarity of it with area of main resettlement was found. However, the density of relatively large nodes increases in Central and Central Black Earth economic regions and in Circum-Pontic region

Train Delay Prediction using Machine Learning

Indian Railways operates both long distance and suburban passenger trains and freight services daily in the country. Trains get delayed frequently due to several reasons such as, severe weather conditions such as fog, traffic, signal failure, derailing of trains, accidents, etc, and this delay is propagated from station to station. If we can predict this in advance - it would be of great help for the commuters to plan their journey either for an earlier departure or postpone, and also lets railways to take measures to avoid delays further. In this paper, we used decision tree, a machine learning method used for predicting train delays, and Recurrent Neural Networks distinguished with various fixtures. For predicting train delays, Recurrent Neural networks with 2 layers and 22 neurons per each layer gave best results with an average error of 122 seconds.

The method for tourist trailers schedule development

In spite of existing methods for long distance passenger train schedule development, the organization of tourist travels in trailers was not paid much attention to until now and, therefore, to schedule development for such cars as a part of long distance trains keeping to an approved train schedule. This article contains the methods for tourist trailers schedule development based on imitation modeling created for application at the railway transport. It was found that the presented method results in labor intensity decrease of optimal schedule development for tourist trailers running as a part of route passenger trains and increase of planning quality for tourist routes at the railway transport.

Profile of Child Labor in Indian Railways

To determine the socio-medical profile of child workers in Indian railways. This was a prospective longitudinal survey over one year. The children up to the age of 14 y entering the reserved second class sleeper compartment of long distance trains in Indian railways were included. The data were collected regarding their profile by the investigators either by interviewing or observation as per situation in the moving train in a predesigned proforma. Data pertaining to the social, demographic and medical aspects were collected. A total of eighty one children were noted in 22500 kilometers of train journey. Sex distribution (8:1) was unequal with males outnumbering females. This study, first of its kind, attempted to delineate a distinctive socio-medical profile in a special group of children. It might, on the behalf of social pediatrics, increase the awareness and help the society to formulate a rehabilitation policy in collaboration with national and international organizations.

Timetabling optimization of a single railway track line with sensitivity analysis

The paper deals with the timetabling problem of a single-track railway line. To solve the timetabling problem, we propose a three-stage approach combining several optimization criteria. Initially and mainly, the maximum relative travel time (ratio of travel time to minimum possible travel time) is minimized subject to a set of constraints, including departure time, train speed, minimum and maximum dwell time, and headway at track segments and stations. Since this problem has many solutions, the process is repeated for other trains, keeping the relative travel times of the critical train fixed, until all trains have been assigned their optimal relative travel times. In the second stage, the prompt allocation of trains is a secondary objective, and finally, in the third stage, the one minimizing the sum of the station dwell times of all trains, keeping the relative travel times constant, is selected to reduce fuel consumption, as a tertiary objective. To consider the user preferences in the optimization problems, the user preference departure time is used instead of the actual planned departure times. In order to guarantee that the exact or a very good approximate global optimum is attained, an algorithm based on the bisection rule is used. This method allows the computation time to be reduced in at least one order of magnitude for 42 trains. The problem of sensitivity analysis is also discussed, and closed form formulas for the sensitivities in terms of the dual variables are given. Several examples of applications are presented to illustrate the goodness of the proposed method. The results show that an adequate selection of intermediate stations and of the departure times are crucial in the good performance of the line and that inadequate spacings between consecutive trains can block the line. In addition, it is shown that, in order to improve performance, regional trains must be scheduled just ahead of or following the long distance trains, rather than having independent schedules. The sensitivities are shown to be very useful in identifying critical trains, segments, stations, departure times, and headways and in suggesting line infrastructure changes.

Groundwater Management in Central Berlin

The Spreebogen area in central Berlin is the site of a large and complex tunnelling project that calls for three parallel tunnels to serve long distance trains, a subway line and a roadway. The tunnels for the long distance and subway rail lines are shield tunnels, while the road tunnel is being built by the open-pit technique. Extensive environmental impact studies were conducted for this large project to assess the existing situation and forecast the impact of construction on the surface water and groundwater. The Tiergarten Park, with its groundwater-dependent vegetation has been given particular attention in these studies.

ExpressMAN: Exploiting Traffic Locality in Expressnet

ExpressMAN is a metropolitan area network architecture which connects users grouped in different clusters. It retains all the positive features of LAN's, but in addition, allows for parallel transmission of local traffic. The overall network structure is halfway between a linear bus and a two-level hierarchical structure in which several subnetworks are connected by a backbone network. However, it does not need complex routing facilities like bridges. Based on the Expressnet access mechanism, it can be dynamically configured either as a unique bus or as several different local buses which allow the circulation of long distance and local trains, respectively. Routing is performed by the transmitting stations choosing the correct train. Local communications can take the bandwidth not used by long distance trains, and thus increase bandwidth efficiency by means of parallel transmissions. In this paper, the performance of ExpressMAN is evaluated and compared to that achieved by the aforementioned two-level structure based on Express networks. Although the Expressnet mechanism has been chosen as the simplest and most efficient mechanism available for LAN's the principle underlying ExpressMAN could be applied to other token schemes such as the token ring.