Technical Stations Research Articles

IMPROVEMENT OF SUPERVISORY CONTROL OF TRAIN MOVEMENT BY MEANS OF INTRODUCTION OF OPERATIONAL ZONES

Purpose. The work is aimed to investigate the feasibility of transferring automatic control to low-density stations of the sections (according to the principle of supervisory control of trainline) to the operators at principal stations. Methodology. The article analyzes the work of heavy traffic sections of the Ukrainian Railways JSC. It was found out that the information workload of dispatchers who control the train movement at the sections of the main course, constantly exceeds the permissible level. The possibility of using the technology of supervisory control of train movement by the introduction of operational zones has been investigated. Findings. The authors found out that the capacity of receiving and departure tracks at the stations of the sections is extremely limited. The occupancy of run-around tracks by the out-of-work trains hinders any regulatory measures at the sections. Trains pass one after another without giving priority, that is, they pass through the section in the order in which they entered it. Due to the limited number of tracks at the pre-section intermediate station, freight trains are placed for run-around by the passenger ones at the distant approaches. This leads to a loss of service speed and reduces the level of utilization of the sections` working capacity. The introduction of operational zones will significantly reduce information flows and facilitate the work of the train dispatchers, create the necessary conditions for creative decision-making on the inter-sectional regulation, and will contribute to increase in the service speed of trains. Originality. The article developed a new technology to improve the management of train sections by dividing them into operational zones. In each zone, consisting of two or three run-arounds, the duty officer of the principal station, performing in this case the functions of the train dispatcher, can control the train movement. Practical value. It has been proposed to put trains from technical stations that idle due to uneven movement, especially the trains from the terminal stations (division points) of the locomotive circulation sections, to reserve routes of the pre-section intermediate stations. Laying the reserve tracks and their maintenance, taking into account the periodicity of use and reduced permissible speed, can be allowed according to less tight standards for the construction of the roadbed, ballast section, sleeper density, taking into account the use of switches and decommissioned tracks.

Main directions of improvement of the method for calculation of idle time of cars at technical stations

The article is devoted to comparison of the existing and improved method of calculating the idle time of cars at technical stations. The positive and negative sides of that method are considered. In the analysis result, the main factors influencing the finding time of the cars at the technical station were revealed: the level of technical equipment, organizational structure, technology and organization of operations at the station, the volumes of train and shunting operations, the degree of unevenness of the arrival of train cars and trains. Currently on the Latvian Railway, the idle time of train cars under technological and cargo operations are actually determined from the moment of arrival at the station before moment of the departure from it. Thus, the existing method of calculating the idle time of train cars at technical stations does not foresee the prediction of this indicator and an assessment of the impact of innovations of a technical, technological and organizational nature. The article suggests the main directions of improving of the method for calculating the idle time of train cars by allowing us to take into full consideration the technical equipment, the technology of operations and the unevenness of the arrival of train cars to the technical station.

Technological and economic estimation of efficiency of a route choice for transportation of dangerous goods

One of the main conditions for the transportation of goods, especially dangerous, is minimizing all types of eventual cost in the event of an emergency. The cost value depends on multiples factors, which are significantly influenced by the location of the train in different places (such as running line, technical stations, residential places, etc.). The proposed approaches on the basis of the queuing theory will allow choosing traveling routes of cars with dangerous goods providing the minimum average cost reduced to one emergency situation.

TECHNIQUE FOR MINIMIZATION OF MONTHLY EXPENDITURES FOR FUNCTIONS-ONIATION OF CARGO RAILWAY TRANSPORT IN UKRAINE

The purpose of the article is to develop a methodology for minimizing monthly expenses to justify the implementation of rational organizational and economic decisions to improve the quality of transport services for cargo owners and the operation of freight rail transport. The research methodology reveals the economic nature of the transport process, taking into account the costs of railways to perform initial operations at loading stations, moving cargo sections, performing the whole complex of operations at technical stations and unloading stations, as well as the costs of moving empty cars. This approach is due to the fact that the quality of transport services for cargo owners depends both on the duration of delivery of goods to destinations and on the cost of transporting them, which determines the price of any goods at the point of consumption, therefore the task of reducing the transport component of the cost of goods is complex and important for railway transport and cargo owners. Findings . As the generalizations show, in market conditions, the task of increasing the efficiency of cargo delivery should be solved not only by technical and technological improvement of the main railway transport, but also by industrial railway transport, where the average simple wagons usually exceed fourteen days. Industrial enterprises almost do not develop their own transport infrastructure, and often use railroad freight cars as warehouses on wheels through an economically unreasonable small fee for using railcars, which is many times smaller than the income of railways from each railcar used by the cargo owner in transportation. Therefore, the time is ripe at the state level to urgently introduce a compromise system for managing cargo resources, taking into account the interests of both customers and railways, and the implementation of detailed technical and economic calculations for various possible options for technical and technological development of industrial and mainline transport. The originality and practical value of the presented research consists in a clear construction of the functionality of monthly operating costs for the delivery of goods, providing for the phased determination of the costs of performing all technological operations during the entire period of transportation.

Increasing the Performance of Electric Traction in the Long Term on the Next-Generation Technological Horizon

Increasing the performance of electric traction of rail transport is a long-term priority. At present, the reserves for increasing the block speed of freight trains only by reducing downtimes at technical stations have been exhausted. An increase in speed will bring a synergistic effect in production activities. The 8-year long-term development program of the Russian Railways holding company (2018–2025) considers the premises of mutually advantageous cooperation of the railway industry and transport engineering and industrial enterprises ready to work for the long term. The implementation of this program should be based on next-generation industrial technologies. This article considers cutting-edge technologies, including competitive high-performance high-voltage direct current traction power supply systems and universal traction rolling stock with increased quality of outfeed from all kinds of electric traction networks by current type and voltage level.

Обоснование размещения технических станций в зависимости от числа полурейсов

Обоснование размещения технических станций в зависимости от числа полурейсов

Regulation of the supply of transit and de-construction of freight trains to the technical stations

The article presents the results of the application analysis of the "Regulation (alternate arrangement) of transit and remarshalling trains approach to the station, with account for the situation in team tracks" dispatching technique.
 Aim: To substantiate the effectiveness of the “Regulation (alternate arrangement) of transit and remarshalling trains approach to the station, with account for the situation in team tracks” dispatching technique.
 Methods: Simulation using the “Simulation of transport systems” (AvroraW) software package.
 Results: The study revealed that the use of the "Regulation (alternate arrangement) of transit and remarshalling trains approach to the station, with account for the situation in team tracks" dispatching technique results in cutting idle time between operations, saving operating costs and in more uniform loading of station devices.
 Conclusion: The results of the study will contribute to improving the efficiency of dispatching control of operational work.

DISPATCHING OF CAR FLOWS: «MANAGEMENT BY OBJECTIVES»

[For the English abstract and full text of the article please see the attached PDF-File (English version follows Russian version)].ABSTRACT From automatic tracking of fulfillment of one of many variants of a plan for train formation, it is time to move on to a flexible operational system of its timely adjustment. The management of car flows should include two systems: long-term and operational. The long-term goal is to solve in advance issues related to direction and distribution of car flows, correspondence between the number of train assignments and loading of technical stations with possibilities of track development and processing ability. The operational system should react to changes in calculation standards and values of car flows, increase or decrease the technical capacity of structures, infrastructure devices and rolling stock, difficulties in operating work. The inclusion of dispatchers in organization of car flows will allow to optimize implementation of the plan for formation of trains. Keywords: railway, organization of car flows, plan for formation of trains, dispatching management.

Issues of regulation of fillability of a train traffic schedule

Fillability of a schedule, down time of trains, quality of a schedule, the use of train paths, reduction of operating costs, train paths, distribution of trains. The problem of reduction of operating costs for the train traffic between technical stations is considered. The analysis of the use of a train schedule is made in this paper. The dependence of operating costs on the route speed, the quality of a schedule and its fillability is established. A solution to the problem of improving the quality of filling the schedule, expressed in the use of train paths of certain categories (direct, or having a stop on the section between the technical stations) is proposed. A method for determining the down time of trains at technical stations is proposed, depending on the fillability of a schedule. The forecast of the change in the main operating indicators and operating costs for the application of the proposed technology for the departure of trains was made.

An adaptive genetic algorithm for solving the optimization model of car flow organizat

Organizing the direct train flow of the loading area can reduce the load of the technical station along the way, accelerate the turnover of wagons and the delivery of goods, and facilitate the better integration of cargo flow and train flow. By analyzing three typical car organization forms in loading area and the hourly consumption index of the train flow in the loading area, a 0-1 nonlinear optimization model for direct routes distribution of trains in railway loading areas is constructed, with the goal of minimizing the total vehicle hour consumption of the train flow, and is bound by the uniqueness of the car flow organization and the number of trains compiled by each loading area and technical station. According to the complex characteristics of the model and the characteristics of the constraints, an improved genetic algorithm that limit spatial search strategy can be designed. This algorithm ensures the spatial feasibility of the solution during the execution through the adaptive adjustment of the crossover operator and the mutation operator. Finally, the effectiveness of the algorithm and model is verified by the example study and the case study of Huangdao loading area.

STUDY ON THE EFFICIENCY IN SETTING UP A MOBILE VEHICLE INSPECTION STATION

The paper analyzes the commercial feasibility of setting up mobile stations to provide people living in hard-to-reach areas with a service of state technical inspection (STI). An analysis of the application efficiency is carried out under conditions of significant territorial dispersion of sites to check the vehicle technical status in the Komi Republic. The rationale behind the efficiency can be expressed through a rate-of-return chart and results of the feasibility study on the operation of a mobile state technical inspection station, carried out in the Mathcad environment. Recommendations are given to reduce the costs and increase the profit from carrying out STI under specific competitive market conditions.

Исследование способа размещения технических станций

Исследование способа размещения технических станций

A new method for solving the problem on the organization of wagon flows under condition of energy efficiency of transportation

The paper considers solving a problem of rational organization of wagon flows in a polygon of selected technological railroad stations using a technique for solving a knapsack problem employing set functions. Based on the results of present work, the authors developed a method for solving a knapsack-type problem that makes it possible to adapt the algorithm of solving a vector optimization problem to the rational system of organizing wagon flows in trains without using differentiation operations and to solve a basic optimization problem employing the Lagrange multipliers. The applicability of the Lagrange method was proved for the problems on a conditional extremum in terms of set functions. Its special feature is the rejection of Boolean variables. We confirmed correctness of the mathematical notation of solution to a knapsack-type problem and proved adequacy of the proposed algorithm, as well as adapted it for adjusting a plan of freight trains formation in order to improve energy efficiency of transportation. By reducing the complexity of the problem, it has become possible to reduce computer processor time needed for calculation, and employ this algorithm when designing an automated work place (AWP) for an engineer responsible for planning the formation of trains. It should be specially noted that a reduction of the time needed to solve a problem makes it possible to timely adjust the plan of freight trains formation, to eliminate a lot of irrational variants when handling wagons at technical stations. The proposed algorithm helps identify variants to direct train flows to the most promising destinations at minimal energy cost for transportation. Limitations of the proposed approach include a closed cycle of routes of the loaded wagons and part of these routes traveled unloaded until the next loading. In some cases, there is a need to change a weight of the train composition, associated with fractures of weight, and, therefore, a change in the balance between wagon flows and train flows.

THE PROBLEM OF THE RATIONAL USE OF THE RAILWAY NETWORK

The purpose of this work is the development of mathematical models and computational methods for the rational distribution of passenger and freight trains on the network of railways on the basis of vector optimization in order to meet the demand for passengers and consignors, depending on the train-km mileage, travel time , Mechanical work on their movement. The main objective of the study is to rationally distribute the size of the Passau-Cairo and freight trains on the railway network on the basis of vector optimization in order to meet the demand of passengers and consignors, depending on the train-km mileage, the time of train movement, and the mechanical work on their movement. The object of the study is a network of a railway test site with peaks at technical stations. The subject of the study is the distribution of passenger and freight trains on the railway network, taking into account limitations on the processing capacity of technical stations and the carrying capacity of the distances. The scientific novelty consists in proposing a new method for rational distribution of passenger and freight trains on the railway network based on vector optimization. The necessary conditions have been obtained to solve the problem of rational distribution of the sizes of passenger and freight trains on the railway network. Practical significance. As a result of the proposed approach, an economical and mathematical variant of the rational distribution of passenger and freight trains on the railway network was developed on the basis of vector optimization in order to meet the demand of passengers and consignors, depending on train-km mileage, train travel time, Movement.

ORGANIZATION OF CAR FLOWS IN MARKET CONDITIONS

For the English abstract and full text of the article please see the attached PDF-File (English version follows Russian version).ABSTRACT In connection with the loss, in the presence of the market, of the relevance by one of the main criteria of the system of organizing car flows - reduction in the turnover time of cars, it is necessary to change the evaluation of the variants of the train formation plan for the costs in reduced car-hours. Therefore, as a replacement, it is offered to fulfill the delivery deadlines. At the same time, in conditions of the privatized car fleet, a combination of criteria for meeting the deadline for the delivery of goods and minimizing the processing of car flows at technical stations was required. In the process of calculating the plan for the formation of one-group trains, all streams of car flows, from the furthest ones, are consistently considered. If the accepted conditions are not met, the procedure of combining distant ones with shorter streams with their processing at one, two, three, etc. stations is performed - until the proper level of organization is achieved. Keywords: railway, train formation plan, design norms, combinatorics, terms of cargo delivery, organization of car flows.

Динамическая система показателей, определяющая техническую оснащенность инфраструктуры железнодорожных станций

Objective: To obtain technical equipment of infrastructure and terminal capacity relations in order to determine the necessary gridiron of tracks, as well as to assess efficiency and optimization of existing stations’ functioning. Methods: Based on synthesis and analysis of stations’ operation, as well as transport systems’ simulation modeling theory. Results: Parameters, influencing the present and designed terminal capacity, were identified. Cause-and-effect relations of events, resulting in railway machinery being brought in non-serviceable condition, are established. Dynamic system of indices was suggested, allowing for a more precise solution of the following tasks: to identify the necessary and sufficient gridiron of tracks for passing the specified amount of traffic, to assess the most probable amount of traffic at the station and its loading. Criteria of input and output flows of traffic at the station, as well as lay-over and trains' delays were stated, the former make it possible to analyze the suggested technical equipment and station functioning. Practical importance: On the basis of obtained relations it is possible to specify optimum relationship of trains’ lay-over time at station yards, the reserve of gridiron of tracks’ elements time in use and the number of routes being implemented at the station, as well as the necessary gridiron of tracks within the given аmount of train traffic. The results of the research may be applied in designing new railway stations, as well as optimization of station functioning and reconstruction of the existing stations.

Devising a method for the automated calculation of train formation plan by employing genetic algorithms

We devised a method for calculating the plan of formation of single-group freight trains, which is based on the use of genetic algorithms as the optimization method. Development of the method is predetermined by the need to improve accuracy in calculations and quality of making management decisions in the area of organization of railcar traffic under modern conditions. A mathematical model is constructed that uses accumulation parameters as stochastic variables. This will make it possible to find the most rational variant of the plan for train formation. The simulation we performed demonstrated effectiveness of the method devised. The method developed demonstrated improved accuracy of about 3 per cent relative to the classical analytical methods. The method makes it possible to consider the limitations on the throughput and processing capacity of technical stations and throughput capacity of the sections. This method uses parameters of accumulation as stochastic variable that makes it possible to find a more efficient variant of the plan for train formation. These capabilities allow us to consider a possibility of applying this method as a basis for building an integrated automated system for managing railcar traffic, which will bring together the tasks of strategic and operational planning at the new qualitative level. Creating such a system, in turn, might provide opportunities for strengthening the systems effect, reducing downtime of railcars, increasing profitability and competitiveness of freight rail transport.

PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS OF SERVICE STATION

In activity the analysis of the existing researches devoted to a question of raise of overall performanceof technical stations which extra execute functions of the boundary transmitting is carried out. International shipping terms by rail significantly differ from condition of carriages of freights in regional traffic.The main problems which exist now in activity of such stations, are linked to delays of the coaches following in the interstate message. It is analyzed parametres of activity of technical station which is disposed on a joint of a track of 1520 mms and 1435 mms.The analysis showed availability of significant figure of delays of coaches because of poor-quality registration of carriage documents, imperfections of interaction of points of transfers export-import to a traffic volume. This absence of the customs declaration, absence of the permission of veterinary service, commercial marriage, absence of a calendar stamp and others. It demands the further enhancement of an informational inter-system of functioning of technicalstations and adjacent state organisations.

Удосконалення технології організації групових поїздів оперативного призначення на основі синхронізації графіку руху на станціях обміну груп вагонів

The work is dedicated to the problem of automation of specialized schedule of group train chains traffic with successive replacement of car groups at several technical stations simultaneously according to the direction of car flow movement.A mathematical model for group trains traffic schedules synchronization at car groups exchange stations on the basis of the determined reasonable variant of integration of car flows according to the plan of making-up of trains has been developed. The given mathematical model is presented in the form of an objective function which minimizes overall time of car group detention at the exchange stations and restrictions which take into account the observance of the technology of group train handling at group exchange stations, inter-train intervals and the duration of train movement on network divisions. The solution of a mathematical optimization model was proposed to be done on the basis of genetic algorithm application. In the perspective an automated system of the coordination of traffic schedule for a great amount of group trains at an enormous network ground can be created on the basis of the obtained mathematical model. Such an approach will allow increasing the level of transport management, accelerating the terms of freight delivery and increasing the competitiveness of railways on the market of transport services.

THE STRUCTURE AND PRINCIPLES OF OPERATION OF A PREDICTIVE MODEL RAILWAY DIRECTIONS

Functioning of an adaptive automated system of operational management of the locomotive park should be based on an accurate operational forecast of the rail direction train operation. For this purpose it is necessary to create a forecast model of the rail direction train operation, the main task of which is the calculation of the readiness moments of trains’ various categories for departure at the technical stations, as well as the calculation of the readiness moments of locomotives and crews for departure with trains. The forecast model of the rail direction train operation includes block forming input information (forming information about the train, locomotive, crew), the trains’ arrival forecasting module (calculation of the forecast time of trains’ arrival), the modules forecasting work of the locomotives (calculation of the forecast time of locomotives’ readiness) and the crews (calculation of the forecast time of locomotive crews’ readiness) and the station functional model (calculation of the forecast time of trains’ readiness for departure) and the locomotive depot model (calculation of the forecast time of locomotives’ and crews’ readiness for departure with trains). The development of the work plan of the locomotives and crews using adaptive model can be considered as an optimization problem solution of binding locomotives and crews to the trains. As an optimality criterion is most advisable to choose the total operational costs associated with downtime of wagons (wagon-hours), locomotives (locomotive-hours) and locomotive crews (crew-hours) at the technical stations while expecting the departure. The optimal variant of the operational work plan of the locomotive park at the railway direction is determined by the minimum of the operational costs associated with unproductive downtime at the technical stations.